A Study of the Gas-Stabilized Arc as an Emission Source for the Measurement of Oscillator Strengths. Determination of Some Relative gf-Values for Fe I

A study has been made of the application of the gas-stabilized arc source to the determination of oscillator strengths in atomic spectra. In this source, a solution of salts of one or more elements may be injected and the elements excited directly in an arc plasma with steady emission of spectral intensities. The source can be taken to be characterized by local thermal equilibrium, but with a large radial temperature gradient. An experiment indicates that when two elements are introduced into the arc in a solution, the relative concentrations of the elements in the discharge are the same as in the solution within the probable experimental error. This experiment indicates one way that the arc may be used for the determination of absolute oscillator strengths. New measurements are reported of the gf-values of 105 lines of Fe I between 2900 and 4150 Å, and the new values are compared with the results of earlier measurements.