IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON PLASMA SCIENCE, VOL. 25, NO. 4, AUGUST 1997 519 Guest Editorial Special Issue on Vacuum Discharge Plasmas T HE XVIIth International Symposium on Discharges and Electrical Insulation in Vacuum (ISDEIV) was hosted by Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL) in Berkeley, CA, July 20–25, 1996. The last Symposia had been held in 1992 in Germany and in 1994 on the Volga River, which started in Moscow and finished in St. Petersburg, Russia (who can compete with a boat meeting?). This time, the participants enjoyed the beautiful scenery at the foot of the Berkeley Hills near Strawberry Canyon. The Clark Kerr Campus, a complex of housing and a conference center, provided summer foliage and catering near the University’s main campus. The comprehensive services and pleasant environment provided a productive atmosphere. Attending the Symposium were 210 scientists and engineers from 23 different countries. Following the tradition of the Symposia, a wide range of topics was covered, including vacuum breakdown and prebreakdown phenomena, vacuum arcs, switching in vacuum, surface flashover, high-voltage vacuum insulation, high-current diodes, intense ion beams, vacuum arc ion sources, and electrode phenomena. The basic science of these topics was discussed, as well as various applications such as switching in vacuum. Two new topics, vacuum arc deposition of thin films and pseudospark discharges, were introduced at this Symposium, reflecting recent developments in the fields of vacuum arc applications and electrode phenomena. The large number of contributions to these topics demonstrated the great interest in these applications. The Symposium program consisted of 15 Invited Talks, 35 Oral Contributions, and 174 posters. Following are some highlights: the Dyke Award Address on “Anode modes in vacuum arcs” by H. C. Miller; “Recent experiments on vacuum breakdown of oxygen-free copper electrodes” (S. Kobayashi, Japan); “Spatial and time characteristics of high current, high voltage pseudospark discharges” (K. Frank, Germany); “Ecton processes at the cathode in a vacuum discharge” (G. A. Mesyats, Russia); “Technological progress of axial magnetic field vacuum interrupters” (E. Kaneko, Japan); “Russian vacuum circuit breakers for electrical networks” (V. I. Rakhovsky, Russia); “New developments in processing cathodic arc plasmas” (D. McKenzie, Australia); “Surface flashover and preflashover phenomena of solid dielectric in vacuum” (T. Sudarshan, United States); “Vacuum insulator flashover: Mechanisms, diagnostics and design implications” (J. Wetzer, The Netherlands); and “Plasma parameters within the cathode spot of laser-induced vacuum arcs: Experimental and theoretical investigations” (N. Vogel, Germany). While not Publisher Item Identifier S 0093-3813(97)05542-2. complete, this list is indicative of the caliber and range of the topics covered. Two awards were granted at the Symposium. The Dyke Award, for “an outstanding body of significant contributions in the field of electrical discharges or electrical insulation in vacuum,” went to Dr. H. Craig Miller, formerly with Westinghouse, now retired. Dr. Miller has contributed in a substantial manner to the understanding of vacuum insulation and vacuum breakdown. The Chatterton Young Investigator Award, recognizing the “outstanding achievement of a young investigator in the field of electrical discharges and insulation in vacuum,” was given to T. Betz, Technical University of Darmstadt, Germany, for his poster “Simulation of reignition process of vacuum circuit breakers in series.” For the first time, two minicourses were held in parallel with the Symposium, one minicourse on “Vacuum arcs and switchgear” and one on “Materials modification and thin film deposition using cathodic arc methods.” Experts in the fields gave a tutorial overview of the various topics, presenting state-of-the-art knowledge to an interested auditorium, and the organizers of the minicourses (Mietek Glinkowski, Rennselaer Polytechnic University, and Simone Anders, LBNL) wish to express their great thanks to all voluntary speakers. Another novelty was the industrial exhibition which gave companies the opportunity to show their latest products in the fields of switching in vacuum, vacuum arc deposition, and other areas related to the topics of the Symposium. The industrial exhibition was visited with great interest by the attendees of the Symposium and gave plenty of room for discussions with the exhibitors. The organizers of the Symposium gratefully acknowledge the generous contributions of the sponsors: the American Physical Society, the American Vacuum Society, Cooper Power Systems, the IEEE Dielectrics and Electrical Insulation Society, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, Los Alamos National Laboratory, Sandia National Laboratories, and the U.S. Department of Energy. Their contributions made it possible to support a number of scientists and engineers who otherwise would not have been able to attend the Symposium. The endowment of the Dyke Award by the Toshiba Corporation and of the Chatterton Award by ABB Calor-Emag Schaltanlagen AG is also gratefully acknowledged. The Proceedings of this Symposium contains 225 papers (2 volumes, about 1200 pages); copies are available from the IEEE Service Center, 445 Hoes Lane, P.O. Box 1331, Piscataway, NJ 08855-1331. U.S. Government work not protected by U.S. copyright. 520 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON PLASMA SCIENCE, VOL. 25, NO. 4, AUGUST 1997 The papers of all authors who expressed interest in the publication of their work in one of the IEEE journals have been peer-reviewed according to IEEE standards, and modified and extended versions of selected papers are published in this Special Issue of IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON PLASMA SCIENCE as well as in a Special Issue of IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON DIELECTRICS AND ELECTRICAL INSULATION (August 1997 issue). The XVIIIth ISDEIV will be held in August 1998 in Eindhoven, hosted by the Technical University of Eindhoven; for further information, please contact Dr. Jos Wetzer, Local Chair of the XVIIIth ISDEIV, Eindhoven University of Technology, High Voltage and EMC-Group, POB 513, Eindhoven, 5600 MB, The Netherlands, Phone: 31-402474492, Fax: 31-402450735, e-mail: j.m.wetzer@ele.tue.nl. The organizer would like to acknowledge the help and support provided by the Permanent International Scientific Committee, LBNL’s Conference Coordinator M. Field and her staff, the staff of LBNL’s Technical and Information Department (they did a great job in preparing the edition of the Proceedings), and last but not least, all authors and referees. SIMONE ANDERS, Guest Editor Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory University of California at Berkeley Berkeley, CA 94720 USA ANDRÉ ANDERS, Guest Editor Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory University of California at Berkeley Berkeley, CA 94720 USA Simone Anders (M’94) studied physics at Humboldt University, Berlin, Germany, and plasma physics at Moscow State University, Russia. She received the M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in physics from Humboldt University in 1984 and 1988, respectively. She joined the Central Institute of Electron Physics, Berlin, where she investigated electrode phenomena in vacuum and in gases. Since 1992, she has been with Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL), Berkeley, CA, where she worked in the fields of vacuum arc plasma and ion sources, vacuum arc deposition, ion implantation, and plasma immersion ion implantation. In 1996, she joined the Advanced Light Source (synchrotron) at LBNL, where she is heading the Photoemission Electron Microscopy project. Her research interests include materials analysis and microscopy using X rays. Dr. Anders was one of the Chairs of the XVIIth ISDEIV. André Anders (M’94) was born in Ballenstedt, Germany, in 1961. He studied physics in Wroclaw, Poland, and Berlin, Germany. He specialized in plasma physics at Moscow State University, Russia. He received the M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in physics from Humboldt University, Berlin, Germany, in 1984 and 1987, respectively. As a Staff Physicist at the Central Institute of Electron Physics, Berlin, he investigated electrode phenomena of arcs in gases and vacuum (1987–1991). Since 1992, he has been with Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, Berkeley, CA. His field of research includes vacuum arc plasma and ion sources, gas plasma sources, ion implantation, plasma immersion ion implantation, thin-film synthesis, and pseudosparks. He is the author of A Formulary for Plasma Physics (Berlin: Akademie, 1990) and more than 100 scientific papers. Dr. Anders was one of the Chairs of the XVIIth ISDEIV. He is a member of the MRS, AVS, and SVC.