Analytical calculation of the gas temperature and time-resolved measurement of the electron temperature of a gas discharge in He and Ne-He mixtures

The gas and electron temperatures were determined in a nanosecond pulsed longitudinal discharge in a new high-temperature discharge tube design developed for a high-power large-volume middle-infrared He-SrBr2 laser. Assuming that the gas temperature varies only in the radial direction, analytical solution of the steady-state heat conduction equation was obtained at uniform power input and, for the first time, for each zone of the discharge tube, namely, discharge zone, ceramic tube, discharge-free zone incompactly filled with zirconia fibers insulation, and quartz tube. The line-ratio optical emission spectroscopy method was used to determine experimentally for the first time the time-resolved electron temperature in the discharge afterglow, namely, measurement of the relative intensities of some He and Ne spectral lines originating from different upper levels. The average values of the electron temperature were also found by averaging the time-resolved electron temperature over the time.