Laboratory experiments on important plasma physics issues of electrodynamic tethers are performed. These include current propagation, formation of wave wings, limits of current collection, nonlinear effects and instabilities, charging phenomena, and characteristics of transmission lines in plasmas. The experiments are conducted in a large afterglow plasma (100 cm¿200 cm, ne≤1012 cm-3, kTe≤3 eV, Bo<100 G, Ar, pn≈3¿10-4 Torr). The current system is established with a small electron-emitting hot cathode tethered to an electron-collecting anode, both movable across the magnetic field and energized by potential differences up to V≈100 kTe/e. The total current density in space and time is obtained from complete mesurements of the perturbed magnetic field, J=∇¿B(r,t)/&mgr;o. The fast spacecraft motion is reproduced in the laboratory by moving the tethered electrodes in small increments, applying delayed current pulses, and reconstructing the net field by a linear superposition of locally emitted wavelets. With this technique, the small-amplitude dc current pattern is shown to form ''whistler wings'' at each electrode instead of the generally accepted ''Alfv¿n wings.''

For the beam electrode, the whistler wing separates from the field-aligned beam which carries no net current. Large-amplitude return currents to a stationary anode generate current-driven microinstabilities, parallel electric fields, ion depletion, current disruptions, and time-varying electrode charging. At appropriately high potentials and neutral densities, excess neutrals are ionized near the anode. The anode sheath emits high-frequency electron transit-time oscillations at the sheath-plasma resonance. The beam generates Langmuir turbulence, ion sound turbulence, electron heating, space charge fields, and Hall currents. An insulated, perfectly conducting transmission line embedded in the plasma becomes lossy due to excitation of whistler waves and magnetic field diffusion effects. The implications of the laboratory observations on electrodynamic tethers in space are discussed. ¿ Copyright 1990 by the American Geophysical Union