LXCat is an open‐access platform (http://www.lxcat.net) for curating data needed for modeling the electron and ion components of technological plasmas. The data types presently supported on LXCat are scattering cross sections and swarm/transport parameters, ion‐neutral interaction potentials, and optical oscillator strengths. Twenty‐four databases contributed by different groups around the world can be accessed on LXCat. New contributors are welcome; the database contributors retain ownership and are responsible for the contents and maintenance of the individual databases. This article summarizes the present status of the project.

No abstract

We report integral cross sections (ICSs) for electron impact excitation of the A 3 + u , B 3 g , W 3 u , B 3 − u , a 1 − u , a 1 g , ω 1 u , C 3 u , E 3 + g and a 1 + g electronic states of N 2 . The present data, for each state, were derived at five incident electron energies in the range 15-50 eV, from the earlier crossedbeam differential cross section (DCS) measurements of our group. This was facilitated by using a molecular phase shift analysis technique to extrapolate the measured DCSs to 0 • and 180 • , before performing the integration. A comprehensive comparison of the present ICSs with the results of earlier experimental studies, both crossed beam and electron swarm, and theoretical calculations is provided. This comparison clearly indicates that some of the previous estimates for these excited electronic-state cross sections need to be reassessed. In addition, we have used the present ICSs in a Monte Carlo simulation for modelling the behaviour of an electron swarm in the bulk of a low current N 2 discharge. The macroscopic transport parameters determined from this simulation are compared against those measured from independent swarm-based experiments and the self-consistency of our ICSs evaluated.

The broadband, 3D FEL code Puffin is presented. The analytical model is derived in absence of the Slowly Varying Envelope Approximation, and can model undulators of any polarization. Due to the enhanced resolution, the memory and processing requirements are greater than equivalent averaged codes. The numerical code to solve the system of equations is therefore written for a parallel computing environment utilizing MPI. An example simulation is presented.