Collisional population transfer between the hyperfine-structure levels of the 5s 5p 3P1 state of 113Cd

Collisions of excited 113Cd(5 3P1) atoms with rare gas atoms (He, Ne, Ar, Kr, Xe) were investigated using atomic fluorescence spectroscopy. By selective excitation of individual hyperfine structure levels with a pulsed dye laser and studying the time behaviour of fluorescence as well as sensitized fluorescence signals as a function of the buffer gas density the absolute cross sections for the population transfer between the two hyperfine levels of the 5 3P1 state by collisions with rare gas atoms have been determined. The influence of radiation trapping has been considered. The results give strong support for the description of the collisions by a decoupling model. (orig.)