Simultaneous Ion-Neutral Trapping and Applications

Alex PovilusJae Choi

Eberhard HansisGeorg Raithel

REU-2004 – 7/28/2004

-Three-body recombination studies-High angular momentum states likely-Reevaluate traditional Penning trap

dynamics (symmetry)-Eye towards Anti-Hydrogen Production

Motivation

"For me, the most attractive way ... would be to capture the antihydrogen in a neutral particle trap ... The objective would be to then study the properties of a small number of [antihydrogen] atoms confined in the neutral trap for a long time." -Gerald Gabrielse, 1986 Erice Lecture (shortly after first trapping of antiprotons)

Requirements of Techniques

Incompatible Trapping Techniques?

Ion Trapping (Penning)

-Homogeneous B Field

-Electrostatic Potential Well

Neutral Trapping (Ioffe)

-Magnetic Field Minimum (H=μ·B and adiabatic approx.)

Apparatus

Internal Electrodes

Superconducting Atom Trap (2.9 Tesla)

Cryo-chamber at 4K

Optical Trapping Techniques

Electron Motion/ Simulations

Sample electron oscillations expected in the system without and with quadrupole magnetic field perturbations.

Experimental Results

Ion-Neutral Trapping Observed ( ≈ 50 sec) at Low Density (105 e-/cm3)

Temperature of Sample Measurement: ~4K

Applications of Technique

Three Body Recombination: High Angular Momentum State Generation:

Haiku and References

Ions and Neutrals

My fields can contain them both

Maybe together

(1) Squires, Yesley, and Gabrielse, Phys Rev Letters 86, 5266

(2) Bagnato, Lafyatis, Martin, Raab, Ahmad-Bitar, and Pritchard, Phys Rev Letters 58, 2194

(3) Brown and Gabriese, Geonium theory: Physics of a single electron or ion in a Penning trap

(4) Gilson and Fajans, Phys. Rev. Letters 90, 15001-1