First ion cloud in our Penning trap

Eine große Ionenwolke in unserer Penningfalle

We have loaded our first Beryllium ions into a cryogenic Penning trap. The ions were loaded using laser ablation from a solid Beryllium target, combined with two-photon ionization. The picture shows a cloud of  ions, imaged by shining a laser beam onto the cloud and sending the resonance fluorescence onto a CCD camera along the axial direction.

Our next steps will be to optimize laser cooling in the BASE Hannover apparatus, control single ions and then proceed towards trapping and sympathetic cooling of single protons by Beryllium ions.

Thanks to our colleagues in the BASE collaboration for the incredible support in setting up the Penning trap and making it work!