First observation of laser-induced resonant annihilation in metastable antiprotonic helium atoms

21 February 1994

journal article
research article
Published by American Physical Society (APS) in Physical Review Letters

Vol. 72 (8) , 1180-1183
https://doi.org/10.1103/physrevlett.72.1180

Abstract

We have observed the first laser-induced resonant transitions in antiprotonic helium atoms. These occur between metastable states and Auger dominated short lived states, and show that the anomalous longevity of antiprotons previously observed in helium media results from the formation of high-n high-l atomic states of p¯

{He}^{+}

. The observed transition with vacuum wavelength 597.259±0.002 nm is tentatively assigned to (n,l)=(39,35)→(38,34).

Keywords

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