Dust plasmas have received considerable attention in recent years due to the fact that a kind of crystal could be established, which is a typical example of an ideal material. In this system, the dust particles are often confined upon a three-dimensional sheath of an axissymmetric concave electrode, where the axial electrostatic force balances the gravitation and the radial electrostatic force keeps the dust from running away horizontally. In this paper, a threedimensional sheath structure is simulated through a liquid model, and the movement of the dust particles is simulated via the dynamic method. The crystals are obtained self consistently. The effect of both the electrode size and the mass of dust particles on the crystals are discussed. The simulation result demonstrates that two kinds of dust crystals could be established by varying the sheath diameter, and some proper conditions are necessary for the formation of a double layer dust crystal.
Vibrational mode in a two-dimensional dust monolayer is investigated by considering the finite size of dust grains. Each dust grain is assumed to be a negative point charge and a dipole moment due to the inhomogeneous charge distribution on its surface. The dispersion relation of the vibrational mode is derived. Both the self-excited and externally excited cases are discussed. It is shown that the mode is sensitive to the direction of the dipole moment.
