FREE BURNING LASER-SUSTAINED PLASMA IN A FORCED FLOW

The boundaries of the existence of a laser-sustained argon plasma in f orced convective flow were investigated experimentally and numerically . The plasma was maintained by a cw CO2 laser with an output power of 2.5 kW and burnt in free space at atmospheric pressure. Flow velocitie s changed from 2.3 m s(-1) to 8 m s(-1). The f number was 8.8. The res ults show that a quasi-2D model in which the axial flow is given by th e relation rho u = rho(0)u(0)(rho/rho(0))(1/2), where rho(0) and u(0) are the density and velocity of the cold gas respectively, describes t he observed phenomena fairly well.