For precision experiments it is often advantageous to trap ions within a small volume, reduce their temperature and have a long observation time and little losses. Therefore Penning traps and Paul traps that enclose ions in a mixture of DC electric and magnetic fields or in DC and radiofrequency electric fields, respectively, have become workhorses for precision experiments. To prepare highly charged heavy ions for such experiments is the task of the HITRAP facility at GSI, which is coupled to the ESR. Ions ejected from the storage ring will be decelerated and finally injected into a Penning trap for electron cooling. Finally, a cloud of cold highly charged heavy ions will be transferred to a number of high-accuracy experiments on the HITRAP platform. LaserSphere is involved in the development of the HITRAP cooling trap as well as in the setup of the SPECTRAP spectroscopy trap to perform laser spectroscopy on hydrogen-like and lithium-like bismuth.
Current projects:
