Collaborative Research: Experimental and Theoretical Study of the Plasma Physics of Antihydrogen Generation and Trapping

合作研究：反氢生成和捕获的等离子体物理的实验和理论研究

• 批准号: 0903916
• 负责人: Joel Fajans
• 金额: $ 1.5万
• 依托单位: University of California-Berkeley
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Continuing Grant
• 财政年份: 2009
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2009-10-01 至 2012-09-30
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=0903916&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Collaborative; Research; Experimental; Theoretical; Study

This award is made in response to a proposal submitted to and reviewed under the NSF/DoE Partnership in Basic Plasma Science and Engineering joint solicitation NSF 08-589. The award provides funds to support undergraduate participation in the overall research effort, which is being funded separately by the DoE under contract UC Berkeley Renewal of Grant DE-FG02-06ER54904 . The ultimate goal of this collaborative research is to measure the relative spectra of hydrogen and antihydrogen. Differences in the spectra could only result from CPT violation. A second, more remote goal is to measure the relative effects of gravity on hydrogen and antihydrogen. Positive results from either measurement would completely change our understanding of fundamental particles and fields. This proposal is focused on the immediate plasma and atomic physics issues surrounding the trapping of antihydrogen. These issues will be studied with experiments at CERN, with classical trajectory Monte Carlo, molecular dynamics, and 3D PIC codes, and with analytic theory. Some of the questions that will be addressed include: how to confine positrons, antiprotons in an octupole at sufficiently cold temperatures; how do leptons interact with the background radiation field; how do antiproton-antiproton collisions relax nonthermal distributions; how to mix positrons and antiprotons so that the resultant antihydrogen can be held in a very shallow neutral trap; how do zerofrequency bounce resonances cause antiproton loss when the confining potentials are changed, and; how to predict the energy and state of the resultant antihydrogen under various mixing schemes. While the motivation for seeking answers to these questions comes from antihydrogen research, many of these questions raise novel and deep issues in plasma and atomic physics.The long-term goals of this research address the very basis of our understanding of the world around us. Potentially, it has deep implications on the nature of particle interactions, on the question of matter-antimatter symmetry, and on cosmology. At the same time, this research is uniquely visible because the study of antimatter is accessible and fascinating to the public. Antihydrogen experiments are sufficiently simple that they can be comprehended in their entirety by graduate students. Consequently, they offer students a broad education. Experimentalists learn beam and plasma physics, experimental planning and design, instrumentation, UHV practice, electronics, cryogenics, magnetics and software development. Along with theory development, theorists can make critical contributions to the design, operation, and analysis of the experiments. The relative accessibility of the material makes it easy to integrate undergraduate students into both the experimental and theoretical program. The proposed research includes significant participation by members of underrepresented groups in the physical sciences.The undergraduate participation adds a broader educational impact through the early-year training of students by introducing them to scientific research as a possible career path.

该奖项是根据NSF/DoE基础等离子体科学与工程合作伙伴关系联合招标NSF 08-589提交并审查的提案作出的。该奖项提供资金支持本科生参与整体研究工作，该工作由美国能源部根据加州大学伯克利分校续约资助DE-FG02-06ER54904合同单独资助。这项合作研究的最终目标是测量氢和反氢的相对光谱。光谱上的差异只能由CPT违和引起。第二个更遥远的目标是测量重力对氢和反氢的相对影响。任何一种测量的积极结果都将彻底改变我们对基本粒子和基本场的理解。本提案的重点是围绕反氢俘获的直接等离子体和原子物理问题。这些问题将通过在CERN的实验、经典轨迹蒙特卡罗、分子动力学、3D PIC代码和解析理论进行研究。将要解决的一些问题包括：如何在足够冷的温度下将正电子、反质子限制在八极子中；轻子如何与背景辐射场相互作用；反质子-反质子碰撞如何使非热分布松弛；如何混合正电子和反质子，使生成的反氢能被保持在一个非常浅的中性阱中；当限制势改变时，零频反弹共振如何引起反质子损失；如何预测不同混合方案下生成的反氢的能量和状态。虽然寻找这些问题答案的动机来自反氢研究，但其中许多问题在等离子体和原子物理学中提出了新颖而深刻的问题。这项研究的长期目标是解决我们理解周围世界的基础问题。它可能对粒子相互作用的本质、物质-反物质对称问题和宇宙学有着深远的影响。与此同时，这项研究是独一无二的，因为反物质的研究对公众来说是容易接近和吸引人的。反氢实验非常简单，研究生可以完全理解它们。因此，他们为学生提供了广泛的教育。实验人员学习束流和等离子体物理、实验规划和设计、仪器、特高压实践、电子学、低温学、磁学和软件开发。随着理论的发展，理论学家可以对实验的设计、操作和分析做出重要贡献。材料的相对可及性使得本科生很容易融入实验和理论课程。拟议的研究包括物理科学中代表性不足的群体成员的重要参与。本科生的参与增加了更广泛的教育影响，通过将学生引入科学研究作为可能的职业道路，对他们进行早期培训。