Collisional Ionization in Lithium Vapor Excited by Nanosecond Laser Pulses

We report a theoretical study of the collisional ionization processes which occur under 2s → 2p excitation of lithium vapor excited with a nanosecond pulsed laser. The time evolution of the electron energy distribution function and the atomic ion density $(Li^{+})$ as well as the molecular ion density $(Li_2^{+})$ at different lithium vapor densities was investigated. The results show a nonlinear behavior of the energy spectra of the electrons created during the interaction of the laser with the lithium vapor. The nonlinear behavior results from superelastic collisions between the free electrons produced by collisional ionization and photoionization with Li(2p). The results also show that a competition exists between the collisional ionization and photoionization processes in producing the atomic ion and the molecular ions.