The charging of nonspherical particles in a corona discharge

Electrostatic precipitation of dust may be considered as occurring in two stages: the charging stage, in which the dust particles are charged by an ion stream, and the collecting stage, in which the charged particles are deposited on one electrode by an electric field. The two stages proceed simultaneously in the industrial-type precipitator. The efficiency of the collecting process depends among other things on the effectiveness of the charging process: the particle charge should be as large as possible.