Electric field induced energy level shifts of Argon D states
Abstract
The characteristic of the plasma sheath around structures immersed in plasma is of fundamental interest. In particular, the details of the sheath structure in the presheath region or around objects immersed in flowing ion fields are not well characterized. A key aspect of this work is obtaining the required spatial, temporal and electric field sensitivity. Argon is a commonly used rare gas in a number of discharges. As such it is an ideal candidate for spectroscopic based electric field measurements within the sheath and bulk discharge regions. This talk will discuss the use of an atomic beam system combined with pulsed laser spectroscopy to directly calibrate the electric field induced shift of high lying energy levels. Prior work has used the F states in argon. We demonstrate a two-laser technique that probes the D states with demonstrated high spatial and temporal resolution. Several D states have been identified with usable electric field induced energy level shifts. This work was performed at Sandia National Laboratories and supported by DoE Office of Science and the United States Department of Energy (DE-AC04-94AL85000).
- Publication:
-
APS Annual Gaseous Electronics Meeting Abstracts
- Pub Date:
- October 2002
- Bibcode:
- 2002APS..GECFT1006H