Observation of the Evolution of Supersonic Plasma Jet Launched by a Coaxial Gun

Images of plasma jets launched in vacuum from a coaxial plasma accelerator are presented. The turbulent plasma jet which includes a multitude of filaments arbitrarily oriented along the propagation direction self-organizes into a more laminar flow later in time. The captured pictures of the flow have exposures of 1 mu s or less and were acquired at 45 to 130 mu s after firing the coaxial gun.