Excitation Cross Section for the Nitrogen Auroral Mystery Feature

Details Excitation Cross Section for the Nitrogen Auroral Mystery Feature Excitation Cross Section for the Nitrogen Auroral Mystery Feature

May 2007

adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=2007aas...210.8906d&link_type=abstract

American Astronomical Society Meeting 210, #89.06; Bulletin of the American Astronomical Society, Vol. 39, p.202

Astronomy and Astrophysics

Astronomy

Scientific paper

It is now well known that the emission line doublet at 214 nm in spectra of the Earth’s aurora results from dissociative ionization of molecular nitrogen into metastable 5S N+, but the excitation mechanism for this feature is not well understood, owing to large uncertainties in the photon and electron excitation cross sections. Experiments in progress at the ASU ion trapping facility will provide the cross section for dissociative electron-impact ionization of molecular nitrogen into metastable 5S N+, and thereby help to resolve whether the primary excitation of this auroral feature is by solar photons or auroral electrons. This is part of a project to measure atomic and molecular parameters of nitrogen important throughtout the heliosphere, and particularly important to the ionospheres of the Earth and Titan. Singly-ionized atomic nitrogen ions and doubly-ionized molecular nitrogen dications are created in a radiofrequency ion trap by electron bombardment on nitrogen gas, and both the number of stored ions and the UV radiation emitted by the stored ion population (from decaying metastable N+(5S) ions and N2+++N2 reactions) are measured as a function of time to determine: the radiative lifetime of the 5S metastable level of N+, the dissociation rate of doubly-ionized nitrogen molecules, electron capture rates from molecular nitrogen for both these ions, and the cross section for dissociative electron impact ionization of molecular nitrogen into metastable 5S N+.

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