'Horizontal' thermal equilibrium due to excitation transfer between excited states of neutral He in transient plasma
- 14 June 1978
- journal article
- Published by IOP Publishing in Journal of Physics B: Atomic and Molecular Physics
- Vol. 11 (11) , L353-L357
- https://doi.org/10.1088/0022-3700/11/11/004
Abstract
The distribution of excited states of He atoms in the presence of plasma electrons is studied theoretically and experimentally. It is shown that (a) excitation transfer is important when the electron density exceeds a few times 1016 m-3 and that (b) with increasing electron density, the relative population of levels with the same main and spin quantum numbers approaches a thermal equilibrium between such levels, even when the system is very far from equilibrium in other respects.Keywords
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