Experiments on State Selection and Penning Ionisation with Fast Metastable Rare Gas Atoms

摘要

This thesis describes experiments with metastable He/Ne atoms. The experiments are performed in a crossed beam machine. Two different sources are used for the production of metastable atoms: a source for the production of metastable atoms in the thermal energy range and a hollow cathode arc for the production of metastable atoms in the superthermal energy range (1-7 eV). The progress made in the use of the hollow cathode arc is described as well as the experimental set-up. The rare gas energy-level diagram is characterized by two metastable levels. By optical pumping it is possible to select a single metastable level, both for He and Ne. For the case of He this is done by a recently built He quenchlamp which selectively quenches the metastable 2 exp 1 S level population. In the thermal energy range the quenching is complete; in the superthermal energy range the 2 exp 1 S level population is only partly quenched. For the optical pumping of Ne* atoms a cw dye laser is used. New experiments have been started on the measurement, in a crossed beam machine, of the fluorescence caused by inelastic collisions where metastable atoms are involved. The He* + Ne system is used as a pilot study for these experiments. The He-Ne laser is based on this collision system. (Atomindex citation 16:078832)