APPLICATION OF NONLINEAR-OPTICAL METHODS TO PLASMA DIAGNOSTICS

The application of non-linear optical methods nowadays allows the meas urement of an increasing number of specific plasma quantities which we re previously not amenable to diagnostics. Among those are state resol ved measurements of molecular density distributions, sensitive measure ment of light atomic radical densities, electric field measurements, a nd determination of quenching rates. In this paper an overview of the available techniques and trends is given. Some selected topics are dis cussed in more detail.