Energy Distribution of Electrons from Ionizing Collisions of Heavy Particles

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Abstract
The energy distribution of electrons produced in ionizing collisions of ions and fast atoms with atoms of the parent gas at rest has been measured for A and He. The energy of the incident particles ranged from 0.30 to 3.0 kev. Electrons released at 90° with the incident ion or atom beam were analyzed in an electrostatic energy selector which consisted of 90° segments of coaxial cylinders. The use of a fine wire grid in the region in which the ionization occurred allowed a positive differentiation to be made between the ionization electrons and the secondary electrons from any metal surfaces. The electron distributions for argon ions and atoms in argon are similar and show a rapid decrease in the yield as the energy increases from zero to about 4 ev followed by a plateau and a flat maximum near 12 ev. The distributions for He also show the initial rapid decrease continuing to a small maximum which for the ion is at about 31 ev and for the neutral atom at about 16 ev. These distributions are almost collision energy independent, though with an increase in the over-all yield with increasing energy.

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