N($^{\mathrm{2}}$P) Production in electron-N$_{\mathrm{2}}$ Collisions.

A unique detector which is selectively sensitive to low energy metastable atoms, is used to study the production of ground configuration N($^{\mathrm{2}}$P) atoms following collisions of low energy (0-300 eV) electrons with molecular nitrogen. Time-of-flight detection has allowed identification of at least two dissociation channels with significant differences in released kinetic energy of the fragments. Excitation probability measurements will be presented as a function of incident electron energy and near-threshold data will be used to help identify possible excitation channels.