Abstract
Recent studies1,2indicate that the Na2violet diffuse bands are an attractive candidate for a short-wavelength chemically pumped laser. These excimer transitions have now been analyzed and unambiguously assigned using single-mode laser excitation; they arise from the superimposition of two distinct continuum (bound-free) emission bands—one singlet and one triplet (primarily ).1In beam experiments, the reaction Na3+ X → (NA2)* + NaX(where X= Cl, Br, I) yields direct and efficient chemiluminescence, including emission in the singlet violet band, with sharp bimodal excited state vibrational distributions; the fluorescence resembles that characterizing optically pumped alkali dimer lasers.2In sodium heat pipe ovens, the violet bands have been efficiently produced using various pumping techniques. The selectivity probably arises from the near-resonant dissociative recombination process . Substantial gain and minimal absorption have been measured in the violet in high density Na vapor pumped by a cw krypton laser. Similar possibilities exist for other alkali metals.
© 1986 Optical Society of America
PDF ArticleMore Like This
Zu-Geng Wang, Kai-Chang Zhang, Xiao-Ling Tang, and I-Shen Cheng
THL24 International Laser Science Conference (ILS) 1986
James L. Gole
FN1 International Laser Science Conference (ILS) 1986
Feng Jin, Chune Zhang, and Zuguang Ma
THL26 International Laser Science Conference (ILS) 1986