Plasma Kristall 4

PK-4 is not an apparatus dedicated for specific experiments but rather a laboratory which shall offer the possibility to perform a large variety of experiments with complex plasmas and to react to new developments in this field in a manner as flexible as possible.
The main interest lies in the investigation of the liquid phase and flow phenomena of complex plasmas for which PK-4 is especially suited thanks to a DC-discharge and its geometry (elongated glass tube with a large observational access).

The experiments for PK-4 can be divided into research in three classes of fundamental questions:
1. Microscopic properties of complex plasmas
This category comprises the charging of the particles, the external forces on the particles (e.g. ion drag), the fundamental interactions between the particles, agglomeration, and particle growth.
2. Macroscopic properties of complex plasmas
In this category belong hydrodynamics (e.g. viscosity), thermodynamics (e.g. equation of state), and non-equilibriums aspects (e.g. lane formation, self-organisation) of complex plasmas.
3. Generic properties of classical many-body systems
Complex plasmas are ideal model systems for studying various problems of strongly coupled many-body systems in solid state physics, fluid physics, plasma physics, nano-technology and even nuclear physics because complex plasmas can easily be produced and observed in real time on the microscopic and kinetic level. Hence dynamical processes can be investigated on the level of single particles which is not possible in most systems.

Therefore new insights in the dynamics of those processes can be provided. Typical examples are crystallization and melting, phonons in plasma crystals, dust waves, Mach cones, nozzles, turbulence, and nano-fluidics.