Resonance-Enhanced Photon Excitation Spectroscopy of the Even-Parity Autoionizing Rydberg States of Xe

Xenon atoms were produced in their metastable states 5p56s3/22 and 5p56s′1/20 in a pulsed DC discharge in beam,and subsequently excited to the even-parity autoionizing Rydberg states 5p5np′3/21,1/21,and 5p5nf′ 5/23 using single photon excitation. The excitation spectra of the even-parity autoionizing resonance series from the metastable 129Xe were obtained by recording the autoionized Xe+ with time-of-flight ion detection in the photon energy range of 28000-42000cm-1 .A wealth of autoionizing resonances were newly observed, from which more precise and systematic spectroscopic data of the level energies and quantum defects were derived.