The destruction rates of the xenon

6 s^{'} {[\frac{1}{2}]}_{0}

metastable and

6 s^{'} {[\frac{1}{2}]}_{1}

resonance atoms by collisions with ground-state xenon atoms have been measured by studying the temporal dependence of the number densities of the

6 s^{'}

and

6 p

atoms. The studies have been made both during the earlier afterglow of a xenon pulsed discharge and after the selective production of the

6 s^{'} {[\frac{1}{2}]}_{0, 1}

atoms by a laser excitation in the late afterglow. An original optical pumping technique, using a tunable pulsed dye laser, was employed to populate the

6 s^{'} {[\frac{1}{2}]}_{0, 1}

levels by excitation of the

6 s {[\frac{3}{2}]}_{2}

long-lived metastable atoms to

6 p^{'}

levels. The pressure dependence of the decay frequencies of these

6 s^{'} {[\frac{1}{2}]}_{0, 1}

atoms was analyzed in the xenon pressure range of 0.04 to 1 torr and a kinetic model describing the evolution of the densities of these atoms after their production was established. The rate coefficients for the relaxation of the

6 s^{'} {[\frac{1}{2}]}_{0}

metastable and

6 s^{'} {[\frac{1}{2}]}_{1}

resonance atoms by two-body collisions involving a ground-state xenon atom are (8.45±0.85) ×

10^{- 12}

{cm}^{3}

\sec^{- 1}

and (6.65 ± 1.00) ×

10^{- 11}

{cm}^{3}

\sec^{- 1}

, respectively. Results show that, in fact, at least 75% of this relaxation is a transfer of population to the

6 p {[\frac{1}{2}]}_{1}

level following

{Xe}^{*} (6 s^{'} {[\frac{1}{2}]}_{0, 1}) + Xe ⇄ {Xe}^{*} (6 p {[\frac{1}{2}]}_{1}) + Xe - Δ E

. These collisional transfer processes have been explained by means of Mulliken's xenon molecular potential curves.

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