FIZIKA A 8 (1999) 3 , 195-204

OPTOVOLTAIC SPECTROSCOPY OF A MINIATURE NEON DISCHARGE

DOMAGOJ PAVIČIĆ and DAMIR VEŽA

Institute of Physics, P.O.Box 304, HR-10000 Zagreb, Croatia Tel.: +385-1-4680211

Dedicated to Professor Boran Leontić on the occasion of his 70^th birthday

Received 22 November 1999; Accepted 21 February 2000

We have investigated a miniature radio-frequency-driven neon discharge by means of optovoltaic technique. The optovoltaic signals are induced by a diode laser scanning the neon transition 1s₄ - 2p₇ (Paschen notation) at 638.3 nm. Our observations suggest that 1s₄ atoms play a very important role in the generation of optovoltaic signal. The signal-to-noise (S/N) ratio of optovoltaic detection is comparable to the signal-to-noise S/N ratio of the optogalvanic detection.

PACS numbers: 07.62.+s, 33.80.Gj, 35.80.+s,85.60.-q
UDC 537.525

Keywords: optogalvanic technique, optovoltaic technique, neon discharge, diode laser spectroscopy

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