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Abstract:
High precision measurements of isotopic shifts in noble gases can
provide a very good test of relativistic and quantum electrodynamic
effects. In our experiment, we measured the isotopic shift
between 36Ar and 40Ar for the 3s23p5 (2P3/2 → 2P1/2) transition
for singly ionized argon atoms. We measured the shift by implementing
a Ramsey scheme using two ultra-short (~ 6fs) laser pulses.
The first laser pulse excites the system in a coherent superposition
of the aforementioned states. This superposition leads to a spinorbit
wave packet whose dynamics can be investigated by applying
a second delayed probe pulse. In order to increase the precision
of a measurement, we modified a Mach-Zehnder interferometer,
to introduce a long time delay of 3.97ns between the two pulses.
To detect the ions of different argon isotopes we used a reaction
microscope spectrometer (REMI). The isotopic shift is found to be
(1.22 ± 0.10) x 10-7eV and it is the first time it has been measured for
this transition to the best of our knowledge.
