ABAKO: a new code for population kinetics and radiative properties of plasmas under NLTE conditions

Abstract

In this work we present ABAKO, a new computational code based on analytical models and developed to study the population kinetics of steady-state plasmas. The tool ABAKO can be applied to low-to-high Z ions under a wide range of laboratory plasma conditions: coronal, LTE or NLTE, optically thin or thick plasmas. Autoionizing states are explicitly included. The results obtained with ABAKO are competitive with more elaborated, but also time-consuming codes. Our code provides satisfactory charge state distributions (CSD) and reasonable estimations of spectroscopic observables of high-Z plasmas, as it can be seen through comparison with experimental data.