Kinetic effects in an optically excited gas

Abstract

A resonance transition in a one-dimensional layer of gas contained between transparent parallel plates and optically excited by external radiation has been treated using kinetic theory. A perturbation method has been used to obtain the “first scattering” results for the velocity distribution and number density of excited atoms and the intensity of radiation at any point in the gas. Two special cases are discussed in detail: broad band excitation with inhomogeneous broadening and monochromatic excitation with homogeneous broadening. The effects of particle streaming and wall quenching are shown to produce boundary layer behavior in the excited level density which scales with the particle mean free path. In addition, line reversal of the radiation reemited from the gas is shown to occur and to be a direct result of particle streaming. Numerical and asymptotic results are presented which show these effects. These results should be pertinent to many laboratory and industrial devices in which the particle and photon mean free paths are comparable and to diagnostic techniques which use resonance fluorescence to infer excited level densities.