A study of the spontaneous emission from CO2-N2-He-H2laser discharges C3πu-B3πgemission bands of N2

Results of spectroscopic investigations of the spontaneous emission of CO
2
lasers are presented. The band head emission in the Second Positive System (
C^{3}\pi_{u}- B^{3}\pi_{g}
) of N
2
is studied as a function of discharge current and laser output power. The observed changes of the band head intensities are described in terms of the vibrational energy distribution in the
C^{3}\pi_{u}
electronic state of N
2
. A simple model is developed by which the influence of the laser process can be understood. The excitation properties of the
C^{3}\pi_{u}
state are in reasonable qualitative agreement with the predictions of this model.