It has been established that production of NO-γ emission in pulsed corona discharges is dominated by the energy transfer from
to the NO ground state NO(X
2Πr) while direct excitation by electron impact is negligible. However, recent studies suggest that the electron impact excitation plays a more important role. In this work, we report modelling results of NO-γ emission associated with streamer discharges using two cross section data sets available in the literature. The first set was originally reported by Mojarrabi et al (1996 Phys. Rev. A 54 2977–82) and later updated by Brunger et al (2000 J. Phys. B: At. Mol. Opt. Phys.
33 809–19); the second set was published by Hayashi (1990 Nonequilibrium Processes in Partially Ionized Gases (NATO Advanced Science Institutes Series, Series B, Physics vol 220) ed M Capitelli and J N Bardsley (New York: Plenum) pp 333–40). According to the results, the role played by the electron impact excitation in the production of NO-γ is drastically different when different cross sections are used. The results indicate that the first data set leads to better agreement with experimental measurements.
