Luminescence of oxygen-rare gas exciplex compounds in rare gas matrices

The paper is concerned with the visible and VUV investigations of luminescence spectra of argon and neon crystals doped with oxygen. The relations between luminescence band intensity and oxygen concentration and crystal temperature as well as the band quenching by more reactive xenon doping are examined. A comparison with rare-gas fluorides in rare-gas matrices permits the luminescence of E-max = 4.9 and 6.25 eV in argon and of E-max = 11.65 eV in neon to be identified as transitions from the charge transfer exciplex complex Ar2+O- and Ne2+O-, respectively. The potential energy and the luminescence energy of Ar2+O- in gas phase and crystal phase are estimated, the estimates being in good agreement with the experimental data. (C) 2000 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.