Abstract
Streamers are millimeter-diameter cold plasma discharges that can
extend, branch, and interact with complex collective dynamics to form
meter-scale systems. Such streamer systems can be expected to play an
important role in lightning. Small-scale streamer systems may grow to
provide sufficient ionization and intensification of field to support
initiation of hot plasma channel development. Streamer systems
developing ahead of the lightning channel may guide channel extension
and help explain the observed step-wise extension process.
Rapidly-developing streamer systems may also help explain recent
observations of fast positive and negative breakdown. We present
simulations of streamer system development based on approximate
particle-like treatment of individual streamer behavior but including
large-scale system dynamics including interaction, collision/connection,
and secondary streamer initiation. Here we focus on the observable
effects of such streamer system development, including electrostatic
field change and electromagnetic wave emissions with frequencies up to
500 MHz. Preliminary results suggest high-frequency (HF) emissions due
to streamer acceleration and interaction in isolated streamer systems
are comparable in scale to observations of HF emission from lightning
and develop before detectable static field change occurs, but these
results depend on simulation parameters.