Thermodynamics, Transport and Kinetics of Equilibrium and Non-Equilibrium Plasmas: A State-to-State Approach

Thermal non-equilibrium plasmas have been deeply investigated theoretically by means of the state-to-state approach, offering the unique opportunity of a detailed information about internal distributions affecting thermodynamics, transport coefficients and kinetics, properly accounting for the presence of excited states. The efforts made in the construction of knowledge on the dynamics of elementary processes occurring in the plasma with resolution on internal degrees of freedom, required by the method, are discussed. Boltzmann equation is solved for electrons self-consistently coupled to the chemical species collisional dynamics, reproducing very interesting features of strongly non-equilibrium internal distributions, characterizing plasmas.