Determination of the antiproton-to-electron mass ratio by precision laser spectroscopy of pHe+

Phys Rev Lett. 2006 Jun 23;96(24):243401. doi: 10.1103/PhysRevLett.96.243401. Epub 2006 Jun 19.

Abstract

A femtosecond optical frequency comb and continuous-wave pulse-amplified laser were used to measure 12 transition frequencies of antiprotonic helium to fractional precisions of (9-16)x10(-9). One of these is between two states having microsecond-scale lifetimes hitherto unaccessible to our precision laser spectroscopy method. Comparisons with three-body QED calculations yielded an antiproton-to-electron mass ratio of Mp/me=1836.152674(5).