What is a Dusty Plasma?

A dusty plasma is collection of micron size solid objects immersed in a plasma consisting of electrons, ions, and neutrals. Most often, these small objects or dust particles are electrically charged. The study of dusty plasmas has a broad range of applications including interplanetary space dust, comets, planetary rings, dusty surfaces in space, and aerosols in the atmosphere.

Why study Dusty Plasmas?

In space, dust particles alone are affected by gravity and radiation pressure when near stars and planets. When the dust particles are immersed in a plasma, the dust is usually charged either by photoionization, due to incident UV radiation, secondary electron emission, due to collisions with energetic ions and electrons, or absorption of charged particles, due to collisions with thermal ions and electrons. This means they will also be affected by electric and magnetic fields. As the plasma affects the dust particles, the dust particles can affect the plasma environment. They can alter the collective behavior of the plasma inducing new instabilities and altering wave modes. Because of the unusual and often surprising results of the interaction between dust particles and plasmas, it is an important area of study. For example, charged dust particles immersed in a plasma and radiative environment within the magnetospheres of Saturn and Uranus influence the diameter and composition of their rings.

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