Anions with atomic number lower than 18 had their total electron detachment cross sections measured in the 0.3-1.5 a.u. velocity range (40 keV-1.4 MeV) for He, Ne, and Ar targets with a experimental method developed in our laboratory. Several universal trends were observed: (a) each cross section can be described as the product of a target-dependent curve by a projectile-dependent constant; (b) for a given target all cross sections present a maximum at almost the same velocity; (c) the cross section ratios taken between different periods in a given column are target-independent.
