抄録
The influence of impurity gases on the breakdown voltage of the Penning mixture is investigated. To eliminate the electrode effects from the breakdown phenomena, high frequency (RF) breakdown field in Ar-Hg mixture with small amounts of impurity gases, such as H2, N2, Kr or Xe, is measured at room temperature, using a silica discharge tube. The breakdown field goes up with increasing quantities of admixed impurity gases; the order of effectiveness is Xe>H2>N2>Kr. Discussions are made on the infuence of impurity gases on the breakdown. It has become clear that, if quantities of impurity gases are expressed by the products of their partial pressures and the quenching rate constants of metastable Ar by them, the curves of the breakdown field versus impurity quantities are independent of the kind of impurity. From this result, it is concluded that, in Ar-Hg Penning mixture, the dominant cause for the increase in the breakdown voltage is the quenching of metastable Ar by those impurities. The effect of electronegative impurity HI was also measured. However, HI influence was not large.
