Optical emission spectroscopy for studying the exploding copper wire plasma parameters in distilled water

Abstract

This work aims to study the exploding copper wire plasma parameters by optical emission spectroscopy. The emission spectra of the copper plasma have been recorded and analyzed The plasma electron temperature (Te), was calculated by Boltzmann plot, and the electron density (ne) calculated by using Stark broadening method for different copper wire diameter (0.18, 0.24 and 0.3 mm) and current
of 75A in distilled water. The hydrogen (Hα line) 656.279 nm was used to calculate the electron density for different wire diameters by Stark broadening. It was found that the electron density ne decrease from 22.4×1016 cm-3 to 17×1016 cm-3 with increasing wire diameter from 0.18 mm to 0.3 mm while the electron temperatures increase from 0.741 to 0.897 eV for the same wire diameters. The optical emission spectrum (OES) emitted from the plasma have Hα line, small peak at 590 nm corresponding to sodium and others peaks belong to Cu I. The relationship between the plasma electron temperature, emission line intensity and number density with the formed copper nanoparticles size and concentration were studied. It was found that the nanoparticles concentration increase with emission line intensity while its size decrease. It can be conclude the existence of a controlled relationship between the plasma parameters and the formed nanoparticles concentration and size.