Development of francium atomic beam for the search of the electron electric dipole moment

¹ Cyclotron and Radioisotope Center, Tohoku University, Miyagi 980-8578, Japan
² Graduate School of Arts and Sciences, University of Tokyo, Tokyo 153-8902, Japan
³ Department of Physics, Tokyo Metropolitan University, Tokyo 192-0397, Japan
⁴ Department of Applied Physics, Tokyo University of Agriculture and Technology, Tokyo 184-8588, Japan
⁵ Research Center for Nuclear Physics, Osaka University, Osaka 567-0047, Japan
⁶ Advanced Science Research Center, Japan Atomic Energy Agency, Ibaraki 319-1195, Japan
⁷ Department of Physics, Kyoto University, Kyoto 606-8502, Japan
⁸ Department of Physics, Tohoku University, Miyagi 980-8578, Japan
⁹ Department of Physics, Kyushu University, Fukuoka 812-8581, Japan

^a e-mail: sato@yap.nucl.ap.titech.ac.jp
^b Present address: Department of Physics, Tokyo Institute of Technology, Tokyo 152-8551, Japan
^c Present address: Progress Technologies Inc.
^d Present address: Indian Institute of Technology Roorkee, Uttarakhand 247667, India

Published online: 20 March 2014

Abstract

For the measurement of the electron electric dipole moment using Fr atoms, a Fr ion-atom conversion is one of the most critical process. An ion-atom converter based on the “orthotropic” type of Fr source has been developed. This converter is able to convert a few keV Fr ion beam to a thermal atomic beam using a cycle of the surface ionization and neutralization. In this article, the development of the converter is reported.