Cross sections for the valence shell excitations of nitrous oxide studied by fast electron impact

Abstract

The generalized oscillator strengths, differential cross sections, as well as the integral cross sections for electron impact excitation of the B (1)Delta, C (1)Pi, and D (1)Sigma(+) states of N(2)O have been determined at an incident electron energy of 2500 eV. A generalized oscillator strength analysis reveals that the B (1)Delta<--X (1)Sigma(+) transition is dominated by the quadrupolar component. From the comparison to the previous experimental results, it is found that the first Born approximation is not satisfied for the C (1)Pi excitation while it is valid for the D (1)Sigma(+) excitation at an incident electron energy of 200 eV. The BE-scaled integral cross section for the B (1)Delta excitation from its threshold to 5000 eV was calculated based on its generalized oscillator strength, and the present integral cross sections for the excitation of the C (1)Pi and D (1)Sigma(+) states are in good agreement with the calculations using the BEf-scaling approach.