Role of defects in the heating of the dust crystal in a rf discharge

Melting of a bilayer crystal of classical particles interacting through the asymmetric screened potential was studied using Langevin molecular dynamics simulations. The local melting of the bilayer dust crystal observed in the sheath of a radio frequency discharge was explained by influence of additional particles situated above the main two layers. The kinetic energy of the particle oscillations as function of the gas pressure obtained from simulations well agrees with experimental data.