Theoretical investigation of the vibrational relaxation of CO2 in mixtures containing carbon monoxide

A theoretical analysis is made of the vibrational relaxation in a nonequilibrium stream in a gasdynamic laser utilizing CO+N₂+CO₂+H₂O mixtures. The dependence of the population inversion for the 00⁰1–10⁰0 transition in the CO₂ molecule on the concentration of CO is obtained. It is shown that under certain conditions it should be possible to construct a gasdynamic laser utilizing CO₂ transitions in nitrogen-free mixtures.