COLLISIONAL-RADIATIVE SIMULATIONS OF A RADIATIVE PUMPING EXPERIMENT

Emission and absorption spectra have been recorded both time resolved and time integrated from radiatively pumped, indirectly heated, aluminium plasmas. At the measured density and temperature, using the measured radiation field which pumps the plasma, ab initio collisional-radiative calculations show excellent agreement with the observations. The sensitivity of the data to the rates of various processes has been investigated. For the conditions of this particular experiment it is demonstrated that radiative and autoionization rates are dominant, while collisional processes have no detectable effect. It is further demonstrated that radiative transfer within the plasma needs to be taken into account properly in order to simulate the experiment successfully.