Surface microcosmic phenomena induced by pulsed flashovers

The surface conditions of solids strongly affect the related surface and interfacial phenomena, which implied the difference between its surface and bulk. In this paper, under the pulsed excitation, the pattern and ingredient on surface of two kinds of semi-conductive material, silicon (Si) and gallium arsenide (GaAs) were investigated based on the surface microcosmic analysis techniques, digital metallographic microscope (MM) and scanning electron microscope (SEM) prior to and after the flashover shots. At the same time the waveforms of voltage, current and light of the flashover were recorded for synthetically analyzing microcosmic phenomena. The planar electrode configuration was employed. Some surface microcosmic phenomena about injection and flashover process were displayed and analyzed.