Electrostatic Aggregation of Charged, Polarizable Particles in Extreme Atmospheric Environments

Extreme atmospheric environments are often characterized by scorching temperatures and high densities of charged, polarizable particles. This study investigates two distinctly different extreme environments, volcanic ash plumes and the Venusian atmosphere, where the influence of particle polarization plays a pivotal role in driving electrostatic aggregation, particularly through like-charge attraction at small separations, which is often neglected by conventional models. In these conditions, accounting for complex polarization effects increases the estimation of collision efficiency and collision cross section by up to 25% as well as reduces the value of the velocity critical for aggregation by up to 30%, as compared to predictions by Coulomb’s Law and the hard-sphere limit. These insights have wide-ranging implications for modeling charged particle dynamics in broader industrial, atmospheric, and astrophysical contexts.