Isotopic variation of parity violation in atomic ytterbium
Abstract
We report on measurements of atomic parity violation, made on a chain of ytterbium isotopes with mass numbers A=170, 172, 174, and 176. In the experiment, we optically excite the 6s2 1S0 -> 5d6s 3D1 transition in a region of crossed electric and magnetic fields, and observe the interference between the Stark- and weak-interaction-induced transition amplitudes, by making field reversals that change the handedness of the coordinate system. This allows us to determine the ratio of the weak-interaction-induced electric-dipole (E1) transition moment and the Stark-induced E1 moment. Our measurements, which are at the 0.5% level of accuracy for three of the four isotopes measured, allow a definitive observation of the isotopic variation of the weak-interaction effects in an atom, which is found to be consistent with the prediction of the Standard Model. In addition, our measurements provide information about an additional Z' boson.
Cite
@article{arxiv.1804.05747,
title = {Isotopic variation of parity violation in atomic ytterbium},
author = {D. Antypas and A. Fabricant and J. E. Stalnaker and K. Tsigutkin and V. V. Flambaum and D. Budker},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1804.05747},
year = {2019}
}
Comments
19 pages, 4 figures, 2 tables