Research Papers in Physics and Astronomy

 

Title

Excitation of the (2p2)3P State of Helium near Threshold

Document Type

Article

Date of this Version

November 1970

Comments

Published by American Physical Society. Phys. Rev. A 2, 1774 (1970). http://pra.aps.org. Copyright © 1970 American Physical Society. Permission to use.

The trapped-electron method is applied to the excitation by electron impact of the (2p2)3P state, the lowest doubly excited state of helium which is stable against auto-ionization. The energy of this state, 59.64±0.08 eV, is in good agreement with theory. An estimate of the slope of the total cross section for excitation of the (2p2)3P state at threshold gives a value of 4 × 10-20 cm2/eV.