The Nitrogen Ion Laser

The first nitrogen ion laser pumped by charge transfer from He2 is reported in this work. Intense laser emission in the violet at 427 nm has been observed and found to have a linewidth less than 0.3 nm. The pumping ion, He2 , was produced by discharge of a fast-pulsed electron beam gun into 7 atmospheres of a mixture of helium and nitrogen. Excitation current densities were 1.4 KAsqcm at 1 MV over a 1 x 10 cm transverse geometry. Under these conditions, the efficiency of the emission of 427 nm laser radiation was found to be 1.8 relative to the energy lost by the electron beam in the radiating volume.