Optical Metrology of Magnetically Trapped Hydrogen
Abstract
During the period of this grant, 2/1/91-1/31/92, we completed the new version of our cold hydrogen trap and brought into operation our highly stabilized 243 nm laser system. The new trap has provisions for passing laser light through it, and reflecting it back by a steerable mirror. The light is brought to a focus on the axis of the trap where the hydrogen density is highest. Servo systems control the frequency of the laser light to within a few kilocycles of the frequency of a reference cavity, and also the position of the light beam in the cell. The excited atoms are detected by quenching them with a small electric field and observing the radiated Lyman-alpha photons with a microchannel plate detector mounted on the bottom of the trap. We had one test run in which we searched for an optical signal from the cold trapped hydrogen, without success. Considering that this represented the first attempt to integrate laser spectroscopy with trapped hydrogen, it is not remarkable that we ran into a problem on our first attempt.
Document Details
- Document Type
- Technical Report
- Publication Date
- Jan 31, 1992
- Accession Number
- ADA253229
Entities
People
- Daniel Kleppner
Organizations
- Massachusetts Institute of Technology