INFORMATION IN SPECTRA OF COLLISION-BROADENED ABSORPTION-LINES

A mathematical model is introduced for experiments which yield spectra of isolated, collision-broadened absorption lines. A nonlinear design analysis is then performed on the model to identify the optimum experimental conditions. The information in the spectra is split into components associated with each of the unknown parameters to be estimated from the spectra. By exploring the variation of these components it is shown that spectra with line center transmittances of 0. 25 are nearly optimum for measuring the line position, the Lorentz width alpha , the instrument resolution H, and the product of line intensity and absorber amount. The trade off between signal/noise ratio and resolution is investigated for several different resolution-dependent noise levels.