Dusty Plasmas: A Unique State of Matter

In nature, matter naturally exists in one of four states. The most common (and least familiar) of these states in the visible universe is a plasma, an ionized gas composed of ions, electrons and neutral particles. This state of matter exhibits several complex phenomena and has numerous practical applications, impacting nearly every aspect of our everyday life. Nearly all plasmas that occur, both in nature and in the laboratory setting, contain small particles of matter (dust). When this particulate matter enters a plasma, it becomes charged through interactions with the electrons and ions in the background plasma. Once charged, this third charged species fully interacts with the other plasma components and self-consistently alters the properties of the surrounding plasma. The resulting system is known as a dusty plasma, a non-linear system that is notably more complex than the traditional plasma and supports a wide range of new plasma phenomena including new wave modes and strongly coupled phenomena.

In this talk, I will present a brief introduction to plasmas and dusty plasmas, highlighting how these systems are relevant to your everyday lives and provide a unique system to study a wide range of physical phenomena. I will also present the results of a recent experiment examining the thermal state of a dusty plasma as function of an externally applied magnetic field.