Abstract
WE report the detection of three radio lines arising from transitions between highly excited states of neutral helium (4He). The observations were made with the 60-ft. telescope of Harvard University during the months February–April 1966. The observed helium lines result from transitions of the n + 1 → n type between states 160 and 159, 159 and 158, and 157 and 156. Conforming to the notation suggested in our recent work1 on excited hydrogen, we shall call these transitions ‘He 156α’, ‘He 158α’ and ‘He 159α’, respectively. Their respective rest frequencies are 1716.372 Mc/s, 1652.214 Mc/s and 1621.332 Mc/s. (Adopting a more recent value of the Rydberg constant R∞ (ref. 2), the rest frequencies of the lines reported in our previous reports (refs. 1, 3) are slightly modified. The frequencies for H 156α, H 158α and H 166α are 1715.673 Mc/s, 1651.541 Mc/s and 1424.734 Mc/s, respectively.)
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References
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LILLEY, A., PALMER, P., PENFIELD, H. et al. Radio Astronomical Detection of Helium. Nature 211, 174–175 (1966). https://doi.org/10.1038/211174a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/211174a0
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