Abstract
An experimental technique for the determination of the metastable fraction f of two-electron ion beams is reported. The method utilizes the electron yields of the and doubly excited states, produced in collisions of two-electron ion beams with or He targets. The metastable beam fraction f is determined in two successive measurements at the same beam energy but having different metastable fractions. The technique is applied to the case of ions in collisions with targets. The results are in good agreement with those from our recent paper on similar metastable fraction measurements [M. Zamkov et al., Phys. Rev. A 64, 052702 (2001)]. The method can be safely applied in cases where the two different metastable fractions differ significantly.
- Received 28 January 2002
DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevA.65.064701
©2002 American Physical Society