PERIOD-DOUBLING AND THE CHAOTIC REGION IN RF-EXCITED PLASMAS

The period-doubling and concomitant subharmonic generation are numeric ally investigated for RF-excited plasmas. Due to the plasma nonlinear capacitance, the current and the voltage waveforms are found to contai n higher harmonic components and subharmonic components. Above a certa in power level of the driver, subharmonics which are indicative of a p eriod-doubling(PD) bifurcation are found to become dominant. The equiv alent circuit equation modeling the nonlinear capacitance of the plasm a is solved numerically by using the Runge-Kutta-Gill method. The peri od-doubling and the chaotic region are explored by varying the driver amplitude as well as the driver frequency.