Spectroscopy and efficiency of the200HgBr81and64ZnI photodissociation lasers

The spectra of the
²⁰⁰
HgBr
⁸¹
and
⁶⁴
ZnI lasers were recorded following 193 nm (ArF) photodissociation of the corresponding triatomic salts and the dominant line in the
²⁰⁰
HgBr
⁸¹
spectrum is tentatively assigned to the (0, 23) transition of the
B \rightarrow X
band. The use of
²⁰⁰
HgBr
2
⁸¹
rather than the natural abundance salt was found to increase the HgBr laser's conversion efficiency by 15 percent while
⁶⁴
ZnI
2
more than doubled the ZnI laser output.