Speaker
Matthew Hopkins
(Sandia National Laboratories)
Description
Matthew M. Hopkins, Jeremiah J. Boerner, Christopher H. Moore, Paul S. Crozier, Stan G. Moore, Matthew T. Bettencourt, Russell Hooper
The spatial, temporal, and model capability demands for simulating vacuum arc discharges are enormous. The simulation must evolve from an initial collisionless vacuum (or near vacuum) state through a sputtering phase with surface interaction and low collisionality and ionization, into a growing quasi-neutral plasma with increasing collisionality and ionization, to an explosive growth electron avalanche process, and finally to a steady current-carrying arc plasma. The modeling demands change drastically as each of these phases is encountered. We describe a number of model advances to address these challenges.
