Resonance 2s-2p excitation of lithium in the Li+Cd system

Using the resonance 2s-2p excitation of the Li atom in a lithium-cadmium vapour mixture we observed cadmium atoms excited to very high energy levels such as 6s 3S1, 5d 3DJ and 6p 1P1. As the main excitation process we propose radiative collisions between excited lithium and ground state cadmium atoms followed by an energy-pooling collision between Cd(3PJ) atoms. The temporal evolution of intensities of selected lithium and cadmium atomic lines is simulated using a system of rate equations. We estimated the rate coefficient for the radiative collision Li(2p)+Cd(5 1S0)+hν670.8nm+ΔE→Li(2s)+Cd(5 3P0), to be 6x10-10 cm3 s-1 at T=965 K. (author)