Temporal evolution of electron density and electron temperature profiles in a non-thermal atmospheric-pressure plasma measured by laser Thomson scattering

The laser Thomson scattering technique has been applied for measuring the spatiotemporal changes in the electron density (n_e) and electron temperature (T_e) of a capacity-coupled micro-discharge generated in neon gas at near-atmospheric pressure. A significant difference has been observed in temporal behavior between n_e and T_e after the discharge generation. The value of n_e decreases monotonically from t = 25 ns when the electrical input is truncated. On the other hand, T_e is approximately 1.7 eV at 15 ns and, after this point, T_e rapidly decreases to about 0.8 eV. Subsequently, T_e decreases gradually. These features are discussed on the basis of the recombination processes.