Experimental Evidence of Periodic Pulling in a Weakly Magnetized Discharge Plasma Column

Dynamics of the PRI oscillations coupled to the externall harmonic oscillation is studied experimentally in a weakly magnetized discharge plasma column. Two characteristical phenomena, which are: synchronization and periodic pulling are observed. Experimental findings are compared to the approximate analytical and numerical solutions of the Van der Pol equation with the harmonic external force term: \documentclass{article}\pagestyle{empty}\begin{document}$ \frac{{d^2 n}}{{dt^2 }} - (\alpha - \beta n^2)\frac{{dn}}{{dt}} + \omega _0^2 n = A\omega _0^2 \cos (\omega _e t) $\end{document} . Relevance of the Van der Pol model for the PRI oscillations is confirmed.