Studies of Collision Interactions and Kinetic Energy Distributions of eV Recoil Ions Inside Penning Traps

Abstract

Measurements and techniques are described which lead to charge transfer collision studies of low energy multi-charged recoil ions with target gas atoms and molecules. The recoil neon ions are produced by impact ionization of neon atoms using 1 MeV amu-1 Cl+5 projectile ions stripped to a mean charge state near 10e. The recoils with e ⩽ q ⩽ 7e are confined by the electric and magnetic fields of a Penning ion trap. The number and mass-to-charge ratio of the stored ions is determined by resonant axial excitation and cyclotron resonance. Mean storage time constants > 100 ms limited by charge transfer are observed at pressures in the 10-8 torr range. Estimates of mean stored ion energy are made by examining the ion number stored as a function of axial well depth. Preliminary charge transfer reaction rate constant results are presented. Possibilities for precision spectroscopy on multi-charged stored recoil ions are also discussed.