Introduction
A large number of problems in plasma physics involve the consideration of several chemical species and reactions. Generally it is necessary to read, classify, sort and manipulate particles and reactions and, frequently, evaluate reaction rates and source terms in chemical kinetic equations.
Motivation
The handling of chemical species and reaction data frequently represents a significant
fraction of code, development time and effort and is a source of errors.
It would clearly be advantageous to have a package able to deal with that data independently
of the number or nature of the species and chemical reactions involved and of the problem
being solved or the method used. Such a package could be used as a "black box" moving the
description of particles and reactions from code to a data file, allowing the user to
concentrate on the algorithm and once the code is developed, an easy modification and fast
testing of chemical models.
Description
The PLASMAKIN library, written in Fortran 95, addresses those needs.
The library has the following characteristics:
- maximum number of species or reactions is only limited by the available memory;
- is independent of problem dimensions;
- can be used both in stationary and time-dependent problems;
- supports a large number of species properties and reaction types;
- handles cascade levels;
- computes molecular vibrational populations, assuming a Treanor-Gordiets distribution;
- evaluates reverse reaction rates, including superelastic processes;
- accepts gas or electron temperature dependent rate coefficients;
- includes radiative transitions and resonance radiation imprisonment;
- handles three-body collisions with rate coefficients following a Lindeman-Troe expression;
- computes the source terms for chemical kinetic equations;
- species and reactions are written in a data file using NAMELIST block instructions;
- different units can be used to input physical properties with automatic units conversion;
- several error conditions are checked, namely in data reading.
Obtaining
PLASMAKIN has been published under the
GNU General
Public License conditions.
The library source code can be obtained from the
CPC library or directly from
Sourceforge.