Potential Curves of Diatomic Noble Gas Molecules

Interaction of He 2 5) and He(2 5) with ground state He yields bound and states respectively. The former, lower-lying state is metastable, while the Sj state can emit to the ground 2 state. 

F nre 1 Schematic potential curves of Xcj (aft f MuUiken ). The dashed curves represent states correlating with Xt(5p 6p) + Xe So) atomic states 

Nickerson ascribed these features respectively to two and three-body radiative recombination  

The two-body process populates levels of the state close to (but above) the dissociation limit, while three-body combination populates lower vibrational levels, which emit at smaller internuclear distances and thus at longer wavelengths to the strongly repulsive ground-state potential curve. It should be noted that, in 

The heavier noble gases show first and second vacuum u.v. continua analogous to those of He J . and the presence of bound excited states has been 

---