Determination of Ground-State O, N, and H by Light Absorption and Measurement of Oscillator Strengths

Abstract

Vacuum-ultraviolet absorption measurements of the resonance lines of O, N, and H by the line-absorption method are described. They lend further support to the correctness of the gas-titration reactions of O and N by NO2 and NO. Line-shape difficulties are reduced by means of an optically thin light source. Based on a simple Doppler emission—Doppler absorption model, oscillator strengths, Σgf, of 0.3±0.1 are obtained for the oxygen-resonance triplet near 1300 Å, and lower limits of 0.2 and 0.6 for the nitrogen triplet near 1200 Å and the Lyman alpha doublet. Preliminary experiments on the detection of metastable excited states of O and N are also described.