High-sensitivity electronic Stark spectrometer featuring a laser-driven light source

J S Huff; K M Duncan; C J van Galen; M S Barclay; W B Knowlton; B Yurke; P H Davis; D B Turner; R J Stanley; R D Pensack

doi:10.1063/5.0153428

High-sensitivity electronic Stark spectrometer featuring a laser-driven light source

Rev Sci Instrum. 2023 Sep 1;94(9):094103. doi: 10.1063/5.0153428.

Authors

J S Huff¹, K M Duncan¹, C J van Galen², M S Barclay¹, W B Knowlton^{1

3}, B Yurke^{1

3}, P H Davis^{1

4}, D B Turner¹, R J Stanley², R D Pensack¹

Affiliations

¹ Micron School of Materials Science and Engineering, Boise State University, Boise, Idaho 83725, USA.
² Department of Chemistry, Temple University, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 19122, USA.
³ Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Boise State University, Boise, Idaho 83725, USA.
⁴ Center for Advanced Energy Studies, Idaho Falls, Idaho 83401, USA.

PMID: 37728421
DOI: 10.1063/5.0153428

Abstract

We report developmental details of a high-sensitivity Stark absorption spectrometer featuring a laser-driven light source. The light source exhibits intensity fluctuations of ∼0.3% over timescales ranging from 1 min to 12 h, minimal drift (≤0.1%/h), and very little 1/f noise at frequencies greater than 200 Hz, which are comparable to or better than an arc-driven light source. Additional features of the spectrometer include balanced detection with multiplex sampling, which yielded lower noise in A, and constant wavelength or wavenumber (energy) spectral bandpass modes. We achieve noise amplitudes of ∼7 × 10-4 and ∼6 × 10-6 in measurements of single A and ΔA spectra (with 92 data points) taking ∼7 and ∼19 min, respectively.