A Simple Goal: Complete Understanding of the (Dusty Plasma) Universe

Plasma is the material that forms our sun, candle flames and neon lights. It makes up 99.99% of the matter in the universe. Plasma flows through our solar system and fills the space between stars – it’s everywhere. Dust is everywhere, too. What happens when they get together?

A complex, or dusty, plasma consists of tiny pieces of solid material a hundred times smaller than the width of a human hair immersed in a plasma environment. This talk gives a brief overview of dusty plasma experiments and numerical modeling of dust particle charging and transport in plasma environments. Understanding the charging and dynamics of dust is important to understanding our universe as well as exploring our solar system. Charged dust is the primary component of many beautiful astrophysical phenomena such as comet tails, planetary rings, protoplanetary disks, and noctilucent clouds. It can also be a problem. The Apollo astronauts found lunar dust a nuisance, obscuring visors and instrument readouts, degrading seals, and abrading materials. The Mars Rovers stopped working when their solar panels became covered with dust. Magnetically-confined fusion experiments create dust when plasma interacts with the walls, which can disrupt the fusion process. Insights into dusty plasma will contribute to producing clean energy in the future.