Advances in the optical diagnostics of kinetic processes in atmospheric pressure dielectric barrier discharges

Dielectric barrier discharges at atmospheric pressure have recently received a growing interest because of their potentially advantageous use in a number of applicative fields, in both their main classes of 'volume' and 'surface' geometric arrangements. From a diagnostic point of view, the high pressure regime adds problems relevant to an enhanced role of collision quenching, vibrational and rotational relaxation, while maintaining many of the demands of a highly non-equilibrium system for a detailed characterization of its degrees of freedom. In addition, filamentary DBDs are intrinsically pulsed systems, in which the electron impact excitation is confined in small space regions and very short time intervals, such that a prominent afterglow phase, both spatial and temporal, is present in the discharge volume, and kinetic processes involving long-lived species, chemi-luminescent reactions, recombinations (aided by the large pressure) can competitively come into play in the excitation of electronic states. We have applied our ensemble of diagnostic methods, based on time resolved emission and laser spectroscopy, to the investigation of elementary kinetics in DBDs. Here we present our last two years results that include: Optical-Optical Double Resonance (OODR)-LIF measurements of N-2(A(3)E(u)(+)) density, in a volume DBD that is of relevance in the debate upon the mechanisms for establishing the glow regime; OODR-LIF and emission study on a Masuda type surface discharge; measurement of N-2 (C-3 Pi(u), v) quenching and vibrational relaxation rate constants and its relevance to nitrogen Second Positive System emission diagnostics at atmospheric pressure; kinetics of CN(B-2 Sigma(+), v) formation and violet system emission in N-2-CH4 discharges. The latter issue shows in addition a correlation between emissions and surface status (i.e. the presence of a deposit) that is a clear monitor of a gas-surface interplay.