We investigate a cylindrical plasma system with ionization, by an annular beam of ultraviolet light,
taking place only in the cylinder’s outer region. In the steady state, both the outer and inner regions
contain a plasma, with that in the inner region being uniform and field-free. At the interface
between the two regions, there is an infinitesimal jump in ion density, the magnitude approaching
zero in the quasi-neutral (kD ! 0) limit. The system offers the possibility of producing a uniform
stationary plasma in the laboratory, hitherto obtained only with thermally produced alkali plasmas.