A pulse technique has been presented for generating a complete Langmuir probe characteristic curve in a short time interval which can be varied from 1 sec to 1 millisec. The method has been applied successfully to different plasma systems of our laboratory. Several examples have been given for indicating the type of diagnostic studies being carried out with this pulsed probe.

A simplified method of determining the electron-neutral collision frequency at unit pressurev₀ is presented in a number of gases (hydrogen, argon and air) in crossed electric and magnetic fields utilising the sparking voltage data and equivalent pressure concept. The values ofv₀ for lowH/p are found to agree with those reported by other authors. But at highH/p, the estimated values ofv₀ are appreciably higher for all the three gases. The increase in the values ofv₀ possibly occurs due to the change of the electron energy distribution at higherH/p.