– 63 – Power Density Limits in Dense Gases for Low Energy Electron Beam Excitation

Low energy electron beam excitation of dense gases holds the potential for producing very high power densities in the target gas. This is due to the short range of the electrons in the gas and the consequently small volume ( ∼ 1mm3) in which the beam power is deposited. Therefore we de-velop concepts to pump short wavelength lasers with this technique. A model device of a very compact, low energy electron beam pumped laser working successfully in the near infrared is described in ref. [1]. Here we present the limitations for a system which uses a similar technique. The goal was to determine whether a 172 nm Xe2 excimer laser could be realized in such experiments. However, the results show clearly that a geometry with an elongated beam pumped volume produced by a pulsed, high current, elliptically shaped, 12 keV electron beam will have to b