Differential cross section for electron impact excitation of metastable helium measured by the atomic time-of-flight method

Abstract

The authors have measured the differential cross section for the inelastic process He(11S0)+e- to He(23S1)+e- just above threshold by bombarding a beam of helium atoms with electrons from a pulsed electron gun and measuring the times of flight of the excited metastable atoms to a distant detector. Since each time of flight corresponds to a definite value of the electron scattering angle, the angular distribution of electrons scattered over the entire range 0-180 degrees is deduced from the data.