Emission spectra from direct current and microwave powered Hg lamps at very high pressure

Discharge lamps containing mercury at pressures above 100 bar are commercially used in data projectors and television projector systems. Due to their small size, these lamps are difficult to investigate experimentally, but spectral measurements, combined with radiation transport calculations, have provided useful information on the visible spectrum. However, classical spectral line broadening theory is inadequate to describe the UV portion of the spectrum, so self-consistent modelling of these discharges is not possible at present. This paper discusses the differences between discharges containing electrodes and discharges sustained by a microwave (mw) electromagnetic field, on the basis of the experimentally measured temperature profile in an electroded discharge, and a temperature profile computed from a 1D power balance model for a microwave discharge. A model based on the ray-tracing method is employed to simulate the radiation transport in these lamps. The model has been validated by comparing the emission spectrum from dc discharge lamps with those obtained experimentally. The output flux, luminous flux, luminous efficacy, the correlated colour temperature, the chromaticity coordinates and photometric curves of the lamp were then obtained. These results were also compared with those of a theoretically calculated temperature profile for the same lamp, excited by microwave power in the TM010 mode.