Faraday spectroscopy study of collisional broadening of hyperfine structure components of the 648-nm bismuth line

Highly accurate measurements have been carried out and the spectral profiles of the Faraday rotation of the plane of polarization of light on the hyperfine structure components of the bismuth 648-nm line 4S3/sub //2--2D5/sub //2 have been carried out. The possibility of measuring a small collision width against a background of a considerably greater Doppler broadening has been demonstrated. The constants of line broadening and shift by helium, argon, xenon, and nitrogen have been measured. A more accurate experimental value for the ratio of the electric quadrupole and magnetic dipole amplitudes of the 4S3/sub //2--2D5/sub //2 transition has been obtained