Transition Probabilities for the Prominent Red Lines of Ne I

Abstract

Relative transition probabilities of all 30 lines belonging to the prominent $3s\ensuremath{-}3p$ transition array of Ne I have been measured in emission with a wall-stabilized arc operating in an argonneon mixture at atmospheric pressure. The data have been normalized to an absolute scale provided by recent lifetime measurements of the $3p$ levels. Our results, as well as the data from other emission measurements, have been subjected to extensive comparisons and tests, including a check for fulfillment of the $J$-file sum rule. It is found that our data exhibit a much better consistency than any other set of individual values. On the basis of this analysis as well as our uncertainty estimates, we estimate that the accuracy of our individual transition probabilities for this transition array, except for a few weak lines, is of the order of 10% on an absolute basis.