Current growth measurements have been carried out in carbon dioxide for E/N (electric field/gas number density) values between 84*10-17 and 166*10-17 V cm2 and N values between 4.5*1017 and 220*1017 cm-3. Ionization and attachment coefficients have been obtained which agree with the results of other workers at the lower pressures while the higher pressure results provide new data for carbon dioxide. The results of sparking potential measurements indicate Paschen's Law is obeyed and secondary ionization coefficients have been calculated. A decrease in the initial photoelectric current with increasing E/N and N has been observed.

An experimental system based on Laser Induced Breakdown Spectroscopy (LIBS) has been used to analyze various ferrous samples. A fibre optic system has been used to transmit the incident laser pulse which produces the plasma plume at the surface of the analyte and to transmit back to a spectrometer the optical radiation emitted by the plasma. The measuring system may therefore be placed remote from the analyte which may be situated in a hostile environment such as an operating nuclear reactor. Results show that the system is capable of detecting chromium, nickel, manganese, molybdenum, silicon and vanadium at concentrations smaller than 5x10(-4) g/g

Ionization growth measurements have been carried out in carbon monoxide for values of E/N (electric field/gas number density) between 109 and 182*10-17 V cm2 and N values between 3.3 and 235*1017 cm-3. No attachment was detected and the ionization coefficients obtained agree with the 'apparent' ionization coefficients of Bhalla and Craggs (1961) but also show an increase with number density. The secondary ionization coefficients obtained differ from the results of Bhalla and Craggs but the breakdown measurements are in good agreement. Thomson's backscatter equation is shown to fit the current-voltage variation.

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Describes the use of a digital storage oscilloscope linked to a microprocessor via a GPIB digital interface for the improvement of the signal-to-random-noise ratio of low-level ( approximately 10-10 A) repetitive current waveforms obtained from drift tubes. The analysis of such signals allows attachment coefficient to be calculated for very weakly attaching gas mixtures.

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