Electroweak Nuclear Properties from Single Molecular Ions in a Penning Trap.

We present a novel technique to probe electroweak nuclear properties by measuring parity violation (PV) in single molecular ions in a Penning trap. The trap's strong magnetic field Zeeman shifts opposite-parity rotational and hyperfine molecular states into near degeneracy. The weak interaction-induced mixing between these degenerate states can be larger than in atoms by more than 12 orders of magnitude, thereby vastly amplifying PV effects.

Precision Mass Measurement of the Proton Dripline Halo Candidate ^{22}Al.

We report the first mass measurement of the proton-halo candidate ^{22}Al performed with the low energy beam ion trap facility's 9.4 T Penning trap mass spectrometer at facility for rare isotope beams. This measurement completes the mass information for the lightest remaining proton-dripline nucleus achievable with Penning traps.

Ion-Ion Interaction Induced Nondispersive Dynamics in an Electrostatic Ion Beam Trap.

We demonstrate both experimentally and using a numerical simulation that, under special conditions, the repulsive Coulomb interaction helps to suppress the emittance growth of an rf-driven bunch of ions in an electrostatic ion beam trap. The underlying mechanisms can be explained by the synchronization of ion motion when nonlinear interactions are present. The surprising effect can help in improving the phase space manipulation of ions and the beam control in storage rings and accelerators and may be applied to other systems with many-body interactions in a periodic potential.

Time-dependent dynamics of radio-frequency-bunched ions in an electrostatic ion beam trap.

The dynamics of ions in an electrostatic ion beam trap in the presence of an external time-dependent field is studied with a recently developed particle-in-cell simulation technique. The simulation technique, capable of accounting for space-charge effects, has reproduced all the experimental results on the bunch dynamics in the radio frequency mode. With simulation, the motion of ions is visualized in phase space and it is shown that the ion-ion interaction strongly affects the distribution of ions in phase space in the presence of an rf driving voltage.

Particle-in-cell techniques for the study of space charge effects in an electrostatic ion beam trap.

We developed a simulation technique to study the effect of space charge interaction between trapped ions in the electrostatic ion beam trap (EIBT). The importance of space charge is demonstrated in both the dispersive and the self-bunching regime of the ion trap. The simulation results provide an estimate for the space charge effect on the trapping efficiency.