Speeding up adiabatic ion transport in macroscopic multi-Penning-trap stacks for high-precision experiments.

Abstract

Multi-Penning traps are an excellent tool for high-precision tests of fundamental physics in a variety of applications, ranging from atomic mass measurements to symmetry tests. In such experiments, single ions are transferred between distinct trap regions as part of the experimental sequence, resulting in measurement dead time and heating of the ion motions. Here, we report a procedure to reduce the duration of adiabatic single-ion transport in macroscopic multi-Penning-trap stacks by using ion-transport waveforms and electronic filter predistortion. For this purpose, transport adiabaticity of a single laser-cooled ⁹Be⁺is analyzed via Doppler-broadened sideband spectra obtained by stimulated Raman spectroscopy, yielding an average heating per transport of 2.6 ± 4.0 quanta for transport times between 7 and 15 ms. Applying these techniques to current multi-Penning trap experiments could reduce ion transport times by up to three orders of magnitude. Furthermore, these results are a key requisite for implementing quantum logic spectroscopy in Penning trap experiments.