Blue diode spectroscopy in a plasma focus device

Summary form only given. The 405 nm blue diode has found many applications in medicine as a diagnostic tool for skin cancer. It has also been used to detect fluorescence from living plants, oils, paints etc. In this work, we report on the application of this laser as a diagnostic tool in a Plasma Focus Device (PFD). The PFD is an ion and electron accelerator. These charged particles are released when a gas in the chamber is ionised into a plasma by an electrical discharge. It is these excited ions and electrons which then undergo transitions thus giving out their energy. Some of this energy manifests as line emissions and some as X-ray radiations. The fluorescence from these atomic transitions can then be used to identify the different ions in the plasma, their temperatures and the radiations they emit. Some of the fusion products are neutrons, gamma and alpha particles. Results show that when a PFD is discharged with Argon as filling gas, Ar-I, Ar-II, Ar-III, Ar-IV and Ar-V species are produced. With Nitrogen gas filling, N-I, N-III and N-IV species are produced and with oxygen as filling gas, O-I, O-II, O-III, O-IV and O-V species are produced. The energies of these species range from 1.5 eV to 3.55 eV, the larger energies coming from O-III and the lower energies are due to N-I and N-II. We conclude that simultaneous determination of several species is possible with the 405 nm Blue Diode laser.