Experimental investigation of the Boltzmann relation for a bi-Maxwellian distribution in inductively coupled plasmas

In plasma, the Boltzmann relation is often used to connect the electron density to the plasma potential because it is not easy to calculate electric potentials on the basis of the Poisson equation due to the quasineutrality. From the Boltzmann relation, the electric potential can be simply obtained from the electron density or vice versa. However, the Boltzmann relation assumes that electrons are in thermal equilibrium and have a Maxwellian distribution, so it cannot be applied to non-Maxwellian distributions. In this paper, the Boltzmann relation for bi-Maxwellian distributions was newly derived from fluid equations and the comparison with the experimental results was given by measuring electron energy probability functions in an inductively coupled plasma. It was found that the spatial distribution of the electron density in bulk plasma is governed by the effective electron temperature, while that of the cold and hot electrons are governed by each electron temperature. (C) 2009 American Institute of Physics. [doi: 10.1063/1.3174432]