A KINETIC-STUDY OF THE LOCAL-FIELD APPROXIMATION IN SIMULATIONS OF ACPLASMA DISPLAY PANELS

Electron kinetics determine the rates at which a multitude of electron -driven processes will proceed in low-temperature, weakly ionized plas mas. Consequently, reliable simulations of such discharges often requi re Boltzmann-type kinetic simulations which can self-consistently desc ribe the electron kinetics. Since kinetic simulations tend to be compu tationally intensive, fluid or hydrodynamic approximations are often i mposed to provide faster and more practical alternatives to kinetic si mulations. Fluid simulations, however, cannot self-consistently provid e the electron-driven rates. Instead, one typically incorporates a loc al field approximation (LFA) which relies on the parametrization of th e rates of some local, bulk property of the plasma such as the local E IN. Using self-consistent Boltzmann simulations of AC plasma display p anel discharges, we have compared kinetically derived rates against th ose obtained parametrically from the LFA. The data were used to constr uct a space-dependent, kinetic correction (KC) curve for the LFA rates and then incorporated into self-consistent Poisson/fluid simulations. Additional simulations without the KC were also performed, and all re sults were compared to kinetic simulations. We found that the KC provi des considerable improvement over the fluid simulation results. Furthe rmore, we found that the non-KC results could be reconciled with the k inetic and KC simulations by considering all potentials relative to th e breakdown potential.