Issue |
EPL
Volume 119, Number 3, August 2017
|
|
---|---|---|
Article Number | 33001 | |
Number of page(s) | 6 | |
Section | Atomic, Molecular and Optical Physics | |
DOI | https://doi.org/10.1209/0295-5075/119/33001 | |
Published online | 10 October 2017 |
Quantum reflection of antihydrogen from a liquid helium film
1 Laboratoire Kastler Brossel (LKB), UPMC-Sorbonne Universités, CNRS, ENS-PSL Research University, Collège de France - 75252, Paris, France
2 P.N. Lebedev Physical Institute - 53 Leninsky prospect, 117924, Moscow, Russia
3 Russian Quantum Center - 100 A, Novaya street, Skolkovo, 143025, Moscow, Russia
4 Institut Laue-Langevin (ILL) - 71 avenue des Martyrs, 38042, Grenoble, France
5 Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Turku - 20014, Turku, Finland
(a) pierre-philippe.crepin@lkb.upmc.fr
(b) romain.guerout@lkb.upmc.fr
(c) serge.reynaud@lkb.upmc.fr
Received: 26 July 2017
Accepted: 22 September 2017
We study the quantum reflection of ultracold antihydrogen atoms bouncing on the surface of a liquid helium film. The Casimir-Polder potential and quantum reflection are calculated for different thicknesses of the film supported by different substrates. Antihydrogen can be protected from annihilation for as long as 1.3 s on a bulk of liquid 4He, and 1.7 s for liquid 3He. These large lifetimes open interesting perspectives for spectroscopic measurements of the free fall acceleration of antihydrogen. Variation of the scattering length with the thickness of a film of helium shows interferences which we interpret through a Liouville transformation of the quantum reflection problem.
PACS: 34.35.+a – Interactions of atoms and molecules with surfaces / 04.80.Cc – Experimental tests of gravitational theories / 03.65.-w – Quantum mechanics
© EPLA, 2017
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