Vibrational excitation of the C 3Πu state of N2 by electron impact Original Research Article

The relative differential cross-sections for electron impact excitation of v=0, 1 and 2 vibrational levels of the C 3Πu state of the nitrogen molecule have been measured for incident energies from threshold to 17 eV and for 0° scattering angle. By considering a number of possible angular distributions for this excitation a range of differential and integral vibrational cross-sections and the total cross-section for excitation of the C 3Πu state are determined. These are used in a comparison with previous results where there are considerable discrepancies. Resonant structures in excitation functions of all three vibrational levels are observed and their locations are compared with resonances obtained in different decay channels, from the literature.