Luminous Uniformity Improvement of Xenon Pulsed Discharge Flat Lamp with Multi-Anodes by Using an Auxiliary External Electrode

摘要

Mercury which is used in fluorescent lamps for general lighting has a possibility to cause environmental problems. Authors have been developing lamps which contain only rare gases without mercury. The rare gas lamps are environmentally-friendly, but it has lower luminance than the mercury lamp has. Therefore, the authors have tried expanding positive column by using an external electrode, and 12000 cd/m{sup}2 was achieved by cylindrical xenon fluorescent Lamp. In this paper it is reported that the same method is also useful for flat lamps with multi anodes. An external auxiliary electrode controls electric field and potential in the flat lamp. The external electrode is effective to expand the column in a flat lamp and make it uniform and finally improve luminance.