Frequency Metrology of Helium around 1083 nm and Determination of the Nuclear Charge Radius

Year: 2012

Authors: Cancio P., Consolino L., Giusfredi G., De Natale P., Inguscio M., Yerokhin V.A., Pachucki K.

Autors Affiliation: Istituto Nazionale di Ottica-CNR (INO-CNR), Via Nello Carrara 1, I-50019 Sesto Fiorentino, Italy;
European Laboratory for Non-Linear Spectroscopy (LENS) and Dipartimento di Fisica, Universitá di Firenze, Via Nello Carrara 1, I-50019 Sesto Fiorentino, Italy;
St. Petersburg State Polytechnical University, Polytekhnicheskaya 29, St. Petersburg 195251, Russia;
Faculty of Physics, University of Warsaw, Hoza 69, 00-681 Warsaw, Poland

Abstract: We measure the absolute frequency of seven out of the nine allowed transitions between the 2(3)S and 2(3)P hyperfine manifolds in a metastable He-3 beam by using an optical frequency comb synthesizer-assisted spectrometer. The relative uncertainty of our measurements ranges from 1 x 10(-11) to 5 x 10(-12), which is, to our knowledge, the most precise result for any optical He-3 transition to date. The resulting 2(3)P-2(3)S centroid frequency is 276 702 827 204.8(2.4) kHz. Comparing this value with the known result for the He-4 centroid and performing ab initio QED calculations of the He-4-He-3 isotope shift, we extract the difference of the squared nuclear charge radii delta r(2) of He-3 and He-4. Our result for delta r(2) = 1.074(3) fm(2) disagrees by about 4 sigma with the recent determination [R. van Rooij et al., Science 333, 196 (2011)].

Journal/Review: PHYSICAL REVIEW LETTERS

Volume: 108 (14)      Pages from: 1430001  to: 1430001

KeyWords: Ab initio; Absolute frequency; Frequency metrology; Hyperfines; Isotope shifts; Nuclear charges; Optical frequency combs; QED calculation; Relative uncertainty, Calculations; Isotopes; Uncertainty analysis, Helium; Fine-structure; Lamb shift; Transition; Spectroscopy; Photon
DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevLett.108.143001

Citations: 78
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