Discharge pumping of dye vapors

We report the results of a study of discharge-excited dye vapors. For 20 dyes, fluorescence output was measured as a function of buffer gas, temperature, and discharge parameters. Although fluorescence efficiencies as high as 6 percent were obtained at low power levels, saturation effects limited the output fluorescence to values corresponding to gains of less than 0.2 cm
^-1
.