Electron-excited state of atoms and molecules

A distinguishing feature of electronically excited atoms and molecules is that they have one or a few excited orbitals of an electron. The principal properties of these particles are represented by a high internal energy potential localized on the excited orbitals and the structure of electron shell essentially different from the electron ground state. 

Lx ng radiative lifetimes of metastable states support the high density of these particles in slightly ionized plasma, or in excited gas. Thus, according to Fugal and Pakhomov [18, 19] the density of metastable atoms of helium at pressure of the order of a few Torrs, at temperatures ranging from 4 to 300 K, is about two orders of magnitude above the density of electrons. The density of metastable atoms and molecules in 

Particle State Excitation energy, eV Radiative lifetime, s  

Being formed in the gaseous phase medium, the electronically excited particles (EEPs) reach the solid surface by diffusion. The diffusion coefficients of EEPs are, as a rule, smaller than the self-diffusion coefficients of parent gas, a factor that is associated with increasing of the EEP elastic scattering cross-section at parent molecules due to the redis- 

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