Knowledge Bank

Ar/Xe/$NF3$ mixtures were excited by the focused beam from an ArF (193 nm) laser. $Xe+$ ions are produced by two-photon ionization, the electrons attach to make $F-$, and the ions recombine to make $XeF\ast$. Radiation is observed in the $XeF(B12)\to XeF(X12)$ bands near 351 nm and in the broader $XeF(C32)\to XeF(A32)$ band near 460 nm. At low background gas pressure, mostly B-X UV emission is observed. As the argon pressure is increased to 1000 torr, the visible/UV band intensity ratio increases to about 3-to-l, We conclude from these observations that the $C(32)$ state lies $700\pm 70cm-1$ below the $B(12)$ state. This conclusion should have a significant impact on our understanding of the fluorescence yields and laser performance of e-beam excited XeF.