Spectroscopic Investigation of Laser-Produced Strontium Plasma Using Fundamental and Second Harmonics of Nd:YAG Laser

Abstract

In the present work, our main focus is to find out an optical window where the plasma is optically thin and the plasma parameters can be determined more reliably. The strontium plasma was generated using the fundamental (1064 nm) and the second harmonic (532 nm) of a Q-switched Nd:YAG laser. The spectra were registered using a set of five miniature spectrometers covering the spectral range from 200 to 720 nm. The intensity ratios of some specific lines have been compared with the theoretically calculated intensities to check the validity of optically thin plasma, free from self-absorption and in local thermodynamic equilibrium. In the selected optical window, the electron number densities have been determined from the Stark broadened line profiles, and the excitation temperatures have been calculated using the Boltzmann plot method for 1064- and 532-nm laser wavelengths. The variations in the electron number density and excitation temperature have been studied as a function of laser energy (8-100 mJ), atmospheric pressure (100-600 mbar), and spatial distribution of the plasma plume (0.5-4.0 mm) for both the lasers. The electron number density is found to be higher for the 532-nm laser than the 1064-nm laser, while the excitation temperature is higher for the 1064-nm laser than the 532-nm laser. We have fitted a power law on the experimental data to analyze the varying trends of excitation temperature.