English

Actinide ions for testing the spatial $\alpha-$variation hypothesis

Atomic Physics 2016-01-20 v1

Abstract

Testing the spatial variation of fine-structure constant α\alpha indicated in [Webb et al., Phys. Rev. Lett. 107, 191101 (2011)] with terrestrial laboratory atomic measurements requires at least α˙/α1019 y1\dot{\alpha}/\alpha \sim 10^{-19}~\textrm{y}^{-1} sensitivity. We conduct a systematic search of atomic systems for such a test that have all features of the best optical clock transitions leading to possibility of the frequency measurements with fractional accuracy on the level of 101810^{-18} or better and have a factor of 100 extra enhancement of α\alpha-variation in comparisons to experimental frequency ratio measurement accuracy. We identify the pair of actinide Cf15+^{15+} and Es16+^{16+} ions as the best system for a test of spatial α\alpha-variation hypothesis as it satisfies both of these requirements and have sufficiently simple electronic structure to allow for high-precision predictions of all atomic properties required for rapid experimental progress.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.1508.07681,
  title  = {Actinide ions for testing the spatial $\alpha-$variation hypothesis},
  author = {V. A. Dzuba and M. S. Safronova and U. I. Safronova and V. V. Flambaum},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1508.07681},
  year   = {2016}
}

Comments

5 pages, 2 figures

R2 v1 2026-06-22T10:44:52.531Z