Spatiotemporal behavior of excited Xe*(1s4,1s5) and Kr*(1s5) atoms measured by laser-absorption spectroscopy in unit cell of a plasma display panel with Xe–Kr–Ne ternary gas mixture

We have studied the effects of ternary gas mixtures of Xe(10%)–Kr(20% and 40%)–Ne on the luminous efficiency in ac plasma display panels. Spatiotemporal behaviors of near infrared (IR) emission was measured by an intensified charge-coupled device camera equipped with a narrow bandpass filter and absolute densities of excited Xe* and Kr* atoms in the lowest resonance (1s4) and metastable (1s5) levels were measured by a technique of microscopic laser absorption spectroscopy. We have found interesting features from both emission and absorption experiments, such as longer near-IR emission (0.3–0.4μs) and different temporal behaviors between the excited Kr*(1s5) atoms and Xe*(1s4,1s5) atoms. We have also found that the order of magnitude of the peak density of excited Kr*(1s5) atoms (∼1012cm−3) was ten times smaller than that of Xe*(1s4,1s5) atoms, and that their decay time was remarkably short (∼0.3μs). These results have then been compared with those for a binary gas mixture of Xe(10%)–Ne. At a certain range...