Non-neutral ion plasmas and crystals, laser cooling, and atomic clocks*

Abstract

Experimental work which uses Penning and Paul traps to confine non-neutral ion plasmas is discussed. Penning traps use a static uniform magnetic field and a static electric field to confine ions. The Paul trap uses the ponderomotive force from inhomogeneous radio-frequency fields to confine ions to a region of minimum field strength. In many atomic physics experiments, these traps are designed to produce a harmonic restoring force for small numbers of stored ions (<104). Under these conditions and at low temperatures, both traps produce plasmas with simple shapes whose mode properties can be calculated exactly. Laser cooling has been used to reduce the temperature of trapped ions to less than 10 mK with ion spacings less than 20 μm. At such temperatures and interion spacings, the Coulomb potential energy between nearest neighbor ions is greater than the ion thermal energy and the ions exhibit spatial correlations characteristic of a liquid or crystal. Laser beams also apply a torque which, by changing the plasma angular momentum, changes the plasma density. Atomic clocks are an important application of ion trap plasmas. Better control of the plasma dynamics will reduce fluctuations in the relativistic time dilation, yielding better clocks.