A study of the electron quenching of excimers in a KrF* laser excited by a coaxial electron beam

Measurements of the output energy, the optical pulse length and the build-up time of the laser pulse, obtained with a coaxially e-beam pumped KrF^* laser, were performed varying the total gas fill pressure, the F₂ content and the e-beam current from 1–5 bar, 0.1–0.8% and 13.3–26.6 kA, respectively. The maximum specific extraction energy amounts to 64 J/l. The large range of measurements, especially at low F₂ concentrations, reveals the necessity to extend the kinetics of the F₂ chain in the usual computer model. With the introduction of electron quenching of KrF^* and ArF^* by dissociative attachment the predictions are also for low F₂ concentration in agreement with experiments.