CROSS-SECTIONS; IONIZATION; EXCITATION; COLLISIONS; ELECTRONS

The most relevant approach leading to a thorough understanding of the behavior of non equilibrium atomic plasmas is to elaborate state-to-state models in which the mass conservation equation is applied directly to atoms or ions on their excited states. The present communication reports the elaboration of such models and the results obtained. Two situations close to each other are considered. First, the plasmas produced behind shock fronts obtained in ground test facilities (shock tubes) or during planetary atmospheric entries of spacecrafts are discussed. We focused our attention on the nitrogen case for which a complete implementation of the CoRaM-N2 collisional-radiative model has been performed in a steady one-dimensional computation code based on the Rankinc-Hugoniot assumptions. Second, the plasmas produced by the interaction between an ultra short laser pulse and a tungsten sample are discussed in the framework of the elaboration of the Laser-Induced Breakdown Spectroscopy (LIBS) technique. In the present case, tungsten has been chosen in the purpose of validating an in situ experimental method able to provide the elemental composition of the divertor wall of a tokamak like WEST or ITER undergoing high energetic deuterium and tritium nuclei fluxes.

Aluminum; Tungsten; Collisional-radiative model; Laser-induced plasma; Non-equilibrium plasma; Ultrashort pulse;INDUCED BREAKDOWN SPECTROSCOPY; THERMODYNAMIC-EQUILIBRIUM; FACING COMPONENTS; FEMTOSECOND; ARGON; NANOSECOND; PICOSECOND; NITROGEN; LIBS; EXPANSION

The question of the Local Thermodynamic Equilibrium (LTE) of laser-induced plasmas is crucial regarding the Laser-Induced Breakdown Spectroscopy (LIBS) technique. The most relevant way to assess theoretically the possible departure from LTE is to develop state-to-state models of the chemical species involved. The present paper illustrates such an elaboration in the case of aluminum and tungsten. Based on this state-to-state approach, the two collisional-radiative models CoRaM-Al and CoRaM-W are elaborated. They include elementary processes under electron and heavy particle impact in thermal non-equilibrium, spontaneous emission, radiative recombination and thermal Bremsstrahlung. These models are applied to the case of ultrashort laser-induced plasmas expanding in an argon gas at different pressure, for which a relevant collisional-radiative model is also elaborated to predict the propagation of the shock wave. The laser conditions are close to those used for a typical LIBS analysis under ultrashort regime. At high argon pressure (10(5) Pa), the relaxation of the plasma takes place according to a rather low departure from LTE, as revealed by the thorough examination of the Boltzmann plots derived from the state-to-state models. This relaxation occurs at temperature higher for aluminum than for tungsten, but close to 10,000 IC from 200 ns. Conversely, at low pressure (10 Pa), the extinction of the plasma is observed at similar to 500 ns, just after a phase corresponding to significant departure from equilibrium. These results support the idea of the choice of short gate delays close to the laser pulse for the LIBS characterization of tungsten matrices in tokamak-like conditions. (C) 2016 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.