Cross Sections for Electron Stripping of Fast H₂ Molecules Incident on H₂ and N₂ Gases

Abstract

The cross sections for electron stripping of hydrogen molecules have been measured at the energies ranging from 0.2 keV to 5.0 keV. The measured cross section varies from 1.1×10⁻¹⁸ cm² to 8.0×10⁻¹⁷ cm² for the target of H₂ and from 2.2×10⁻¹⁸ cm² to 2.6×10⁻¹⁶ cm² for that of N₂. In lower energies, the cross sections for H₂–H₂ collision give remarkably smaller values than those by Peterson et al. which were obtained using the large effective angle (∼10°) in contrast to the small one (∼1°) in the present experiment. This suggests that the differential stripping cross sections are fairly large at scattering angles larger than 1 degree in the energies below 1 keV.
Present cross sections will be recommended to be used for analysis in the plasma diagnostics with H₂ molecules using the apparatus with the small effective angle.