High-pressure (>1 bar) dielectric barrier discharge lamps generating short pulses of high-peak power vacuum ultraviolet radiation

We have investigated the scaling of peak vacuum ultraviolet output power from homogeneous Xe dielectric barrier discharges excited by short voltage pulses. Increasing the Xe fill pressure above 1 bar provides an increased output pulse energy, a shortened pulse duration and increases in the peak output power of two to three orders of magnitude. High peak power pulses of up to 6 W cm−2 are generated with a high efficiency for pulse rates up to 50 kHz. We show that the temporal pulse characteristics are in good agreement with results from detailed computer modelling of the discharge kinetics.