In 2018, our ATRAP collaboration produced 5 trapped antihydrogen atoms per hour long trial. An apparatus with a Ioffe octupole trap and a faster magnet dump was used to confine and detect trapped antihydrogen atoms. This apparatus is unique in that four sideports spaced at 90 degrees from each other around the Ioffe trap provide optical access to the center of the trap to allow precise measurements of the 1S-2S transition of antihydrogen atoms. In a Penning-Ioffe trap, positron and antiproton plasmas on axis at very low temperature with a certain radius, length and density can form trapped antihydrogen atoms via three-body recombination. The strong-drive evaporative cooling method implemented in 2018 is essential to form reproducible plasmas. To better characterize positron, electron and antiproton plasmas, the plasma imaging system was developed and the plasma modes system has been improved. With minor modifications of the apparatus, we would be able to produce and accumulate antihydrogen atoms much faster in the future. For this reason, a new design of the electrode stack is proposed. The accumulation of antihydrogen atoms is essential to trap more than 100 antihydrogen atoms in a Ioffe trap and measure precisely the 1S-2S transition.

Creator

• Nottet, Edouard

DOI

• https://doi.org/10.21985/n2-cyq4-v639

Subject

• Physics

Language

• en

Alternate Identifier

• etdadmin_upload_730096
• http://dissertations.umi.com/northwestern:15037

Date created

• 2020-01-01

Resource type

• Dissertation

Rights statement

• In Copyright