ABSTRACT
Einstein's general theory of relativity from 19151 remains the most successful description of gravitation. From the 1919 solar eclipse2 to the observation of gravitational waves3, the theory has passed many crucial experimental tests. However, the evolving concepts of dark matter and dark energy illustrate that there is much to be learned about the gravitating content of the universe. Singularities in the general theory of relativity and the lack of a quantum theory of gravity suggest that our picture is incomplete. It is thus prudent to explore gravity in exotic physical systems. Antimatter was unknown to Einstein in 1915. Dirac's theory4 appeared in 1928; the positron was observed5 in 1932. There has since been much speculation about gravity and antimatter. The theoretical consensus is that any laboratory mass must be attracted6 by the Earth, although some authors have considered the cosmological consequences if antimatter should be repelled by matter7-10. In the general theory of relativity, the weak equivalence principle (WEP) requires that all masses react identically to gravity, independent of their internal structure. Here we show that antihydrogen atoms, released from magnetic confinement in the ALPHA-g apparatus, behave in a way consistent with gravitational attraction to the Earth. Repulsive 'antigravity' is ruled out in this case. This experiment paves the way for precision studies of the magnitude of the gravitational acceleration between anti-atoms and the Earth to test the WEP.
ABSTRACT
We have studied the stability of the smallest long-lived all carbon molecular dianion (C_{7}^{2-}) in new time domains and with a single ion at a time using a cryogenic electrostatic ion-beam storage ring. We observe spontaneous electron emission from internally excited dianions on millisecond timescales and monitor the survival of single colder C_{7}^{2-} molecules on much longer timescales. We find that their intrinsic lifetime exceeds several minutes-6 orders of magnitude longer than established from earlier experiments on C_{7}^{2-}. This is consistent with our calculations of vertical electron detachment energies predicting one inherently stable isomer and one isomer which is stable or effectively stable behind a large Coulomb barrier for C_{7}^{2-}âC_{7}^{-}+e^{-} separation.
ABSTRACT
We report the first experimental evidence of spontaneous electron emission from a homonuclear dimer anion through direct measurements of Ag_{2}^{-}âAg_{2}+e^{-} decays on milliseconds and seconds timescales. This observation is very surprising as there is no avoided crossing between adiabatic energy curves to mediate such a process. The process is weak, yet dominates the decay signal after 100 ms when ensembles of internally hot Ag_{2}^{-} ions are stored in the cryogenic ion-beam storage ring, DESIREE, for 10 s. The electron emission process is associated with an instantaneous, very large reduction of the vibrational energy of the dimer system. This represents a dramatic deviation from a Born-Oppenheimer description of dimer dynamics.
ABSTRACT
This corrects the article DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevLett.119.073001.
ABSTRACT
A sputter ion source with a solid graphite target has been used to produce dianions with a focus on carbon cluster dianions, Cn2-, with n = 7-24. Singly and doubly charged anions from the source were accelerated together to kinetic energies of 10 keV per atomic unit of charge and injected into one of the cryogenic (13 K) ion-beam storage rings of the Double ElectroStatic Ion Ring Experiment facility at Stockholm University. Spontaneous decay of internally hot Cn2- dianions injected into the ring yielded Cn- anions with kinetic energies of 20 keV, which were counted with a microchannel plate detector. Mass spectra produced by scanning the magnetic field of a 90° analyzing magnet on the ion injection line reflect the production of internally hot C72- - C242- dianions with lifetimes in the range of tens of microseconds to milliseconds. In spite of the high sensitivity of this method, no conclusive evidence of C62- was found while there was a clear C72- signal with the expected isotopic distribution. This is consistent with earlier experimental studies and with theoretical predictions. An upper limit is deduced for a C62- signal that is two orders-of-magnitude smaller than that for C72-. In addition, CnO2- and CnCu2- dianions were detected.
ABSTRACT
We apply near-threshold laser photodetachment to characterize the rotational quantum level distribution of OH^{-} ions stored in the cryogenic ion-beam storage ring DESIREE at Stockholm University. We find that the stored ions relax to a rotational temperature of 13.4±0.2 K with 94.9±0.3% of the ions in the rotational ground state. This is consistent with the storage ring temperature of 13.5±0.5 K as measured with eight silicon diodes but in contrast to all earlier studies in cryogenic traps and rings where the rotational temperatures were always much higher than those of the storage devices at their lowest temperatures. Furthermore, we actively modify the rotational distribution through selective photodetachment to produce an OH^{-} beam where 99.1±0.1% of approximately one million stored ions are in the J=0 rotational ground state. We measure the intrinsic lifetime of the J=1 rotational level to be 145±28 s.
ABSTRACT
Measurements of the grand total and total positronium formation cross sections for positron scattering from uracil have been performed for energies between 1 and 180 eV, using a trap-based beam apparatus. Angular, quasi-elastic differential cross section measurements at 1, 3, 5, 10, and 20 eV are also presented and discussed. These measurements are compared to existing experimental results and theoretical calculations, including our own calculations using a variant of the independent atom approach.
