On the mechanism of populating 3p levels of neon under pumping by a hard ioniser

The effect of quenching additives on the luminescence properties of helium — neon mixtures under pumping by α particles emitted from ²¹⁰Po atoms is considered. It is concluded that, under excitation by a heavy charged particle, the population of the 3p'[1/2]₀ level of neon is not related to the dissociative recombination of molecular ions. It is suggested that the most likely channels for populating the 3p level are the excitation transfer from metastable helium atoms to neon atoms and direct excitation of neon by nuclear particles and secondary electrons.