Microwave Diagnostics for Studies of Electromagnetic Scattering by Fluorescent Lamp Plasma

This paper rerports a related microwave diagnostic methhod that measures both the electron number density and the electron-neu- tral collision frequency, which are crucial to understand the behavior of microwave traveling in plasma. Arrays of standard commercial fluoresoent lamp placed directly against each other in two rows are used to produce a plasma layer. Attenuations of microwave by plasma layer are studied experimentally in the frequencies of 1--8 C44z using a synthesized signal generator and a spectnnn analyzer. Two wavepolarizations are trader investigation： dectric field of the wave is either parallel （ E -wave） or perpendicular （H-wave） to the fluorescent lamp axis. The electron number density and the electron-neutral collision frequency of fluorescent lamp plasma are obtained by microwave diagnostics, for the purpose of analyzing microwave scattering characteristics by plasma.