Lifetime measurement of the metastable 3d 2D5/2 state in the 40Ca+ ion using the shelving technique on a few-ion string

Staanum, Peter; Jensen, Inger S.; Martinussen, Randi G.; Voigt, Dirk; Drewsen, Michael

Lifetime measurement of the metastable 3d 2D5/2 state in the 40Ca+ ion using the shelving technique on a few-ion string

Authors

Staanum, Peter

Jensen, Inger S.

Martinussen, Randi G.

Voigt, Dirk

Drewsen, Michael

Description

We present a measurement of the lifetime of the metastable 3d 2D5/2 state in the 40Ca+ ion, using the so-called shelving technique on a string of five Doppler laser-cooled ions in a linear Paul trap. A detailed account of the data analysis is given, and systematic effects due to unwanted excitation processes and collisions with background gas atoms are discussed and estimated. From a total of 6805 shelving events, we obtain a lifetime tau=1149+/-14(stat.)+/-4(sys.)ms, a result which is in agreement with the most recent measurements.
10 pages, 7 figures. Submitted for publication