Abstract
The instantaneous response to illumination of photosensitive discharge tubes in relaxation oscillation circuits has been investigated, using light sources of periodically varying light output to irradiate the tubes. A brief theoretical outline is given of the effect of periodic variations on sawtooth oscillations and this is applied to the oscillations of neon discharge tubes illuminated by sources giving a light output of rectified sinusoidal waveform. Photographs are given of oscillation traces of tubes illuminated by light from mercury vapour lamps and by intermittent light pulses. It is shown that, under certain conditions, a complete delineation of the light output waveform is obtained. This method can be used for the determination of the light variation frequency or for studying the waveform of the light output from a source.
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