The characteristics of current and voltage in an external electrode fluorescent lamp

Summary form only given. From the general I-V characteristics of EEFLs, the important issues in this study are to obtain the Townsend coefficients of the discharge, the ionization rate /spl alpha/ and the ion induced electron emission rate of the effective /spl gamma/ corresponding to EEFLs. The first coefficient is determined in the analysis of the dark current region. In this study the non-uniform field in cylindrical tube geometry is considered. Second, the range of gamma value was estimated. The EEFL discharge is the phenomena under the non-uniform electric field. In this experiment the dark current region shows the parameters A= 0.4/(cm torr) and B=71 volt/(cm torr) in the first Townsend coefficients. Townsend breakdown region having the second coefficient of /spl gamma/=0.57 shows the increasing of the current with the constant voltage about 1 kV. Finally, the normal glow region represents the behavior of the positive resistance in I-V.