A time-of-flight technique has been used to measure the radiative lifetime of the
21S0 state of helium. After passing from a cooled source, helium atoms are excited by a pulsed anti-parallel electron beam. The atomic beam then contains not only ground-state helium atoms but also metastable atoms in both the
23S1 and the
21S0 states. The metastable atoms are detected at two positions, 1.9 and 6.7 m from the electron gun, by Auger ejection of an electron from a copper target, the first of which is a 60% transmitting mesh. Ground-state helium atoms cannot cause an electron to be ejected and hence are not detected. The time-of-flight distribution for the metastable
21S0 state is separated from that of the
23S1 state by illuminating the beam with an rf-discharge helium lamp. The
21S0 state is quenched by resonant absorption of a 20 581 - \AA{}A photon, raising the atom to the
21P1 state, which then decays preferentially to the
1S0 ground state; the
23S1 state remains unaffected because it is the ground state for the triplet system. The time-of-flight distribution for the
21S0 atoms is therefore obtained from the difference between the full beam and the quenched beam. A comparison of the number of
21S0 metastables within a given velocity interval at the two detectors determines the number which decay in flight and yields a value for the two-photon radiative lifetime. The value of the singlet lifetime for both
He3 and
He4 is 19.7 \ifmmode\pm\else\textpm\fi{} 1.0 msec, agreeing with the theoretical value of 19.5 msec, but disagreeing with the value 38 \ifmmode\pm\else\textpm\fi{} 8 msec measured by Pearl using a movable detector. The 1.0-msec error is an estimate of the remaining systematic errors in the experiment.
A time-of-flight technique has been used to measure the quenching of the
21S0 metastable state of helium by a static electric field. Neutral ground-state helium atoms effusing from a cooled source slit are immediately excited to the
21S0 and
23S1 metastable states by a pulse of antiparallel magnetically focused electrons. The metastable beam is collimated before passing through a uniform electric field region 0.5 m long and is then preferentially detected at the end of the time-of-flight region, 1.825 m from the electron gun. The time-of-flight distribution for the
21S0 state is separated from that of the
23S1 state by illuminating the beam before the electric field region with an rf-discharge helium lamp. The
21S0 state is quenched by resonant absorption of a 20 581-\AA{} photon, raising the atom to the
21P1 state, which then decays to the
1S0 ground state; the
23S1 state remains unaffected because it is the ground state for the triplet system. The
21S0 time-of-flight distribution is therefore obtained from the difference between the full beam and the quenched beam. The number of
21S0 atoms arriving at the detector in specific velocity intervals with the electric field off is compared to the number with the field on to determine the quenching rate (
=kE2). The result for the quenching constant
k for both
He3 and
He4 with
E in kV/cm is $k=0.933\ifmmode\pm\else\textpm\fi{}0.005$; this value is in good agreement with theory and with an earlier less accurate experiment. The error in the present experiment arises from a 0.5% uncertainty in the effective length of the electric field region.
The static dipole polarizability of helium atoms in the metastable
23S1 and
21S0 states has been determined by measuring the deflection of a beam of excited helium atoms that is caused by an inhomogeneous electric field of known properties. The necessary velocity distribution information is obtained from time-of-flight measurements, and a resonance quenching technique made it possible to distinguish the singlet and triplet components of the beam. The results, $\ensuremath{\alpha}(2^{3}S_{1})=(44.6\ifmmode\pm\else\textpm\fi{}3)\ifmmode\times\else\texttimes\fi{}{10}^{\ensuremath{-}24}$
cm3 and $\ensuremath{\alpha}(2^{1}S_{0})=(108\ifmmode\pm\else\textpm\fi{}13)\ifmmode\times\else\texttimes\fi{}{10}^{\ensuremath{-}24}$
cm3, agree with the theoretical value that has been used to calibrate earlier polarizability measurements of the alkali metals and the heavier noble gases.
The Zeeman splitting of the metastable 5
D3/2 level of
138Ba+ in a magnetic field of 6 T has been measured in a laser-microwave double resonance experiment in a Penning ion trap. The magnetic field at the ion's position is determined by the cyclotron frequency of electrons stored in the same trap. From the ratio of both transition frequencies we obtain a
gJ value of 0.799 327 8(3). As a by-product, we confirmed earlier measurements on the 6
S1/2 ground-state
gJ factor to 2.002 492 2(10). The precision in both experiments is sufficient to test relativistic many-body calculations. \textcopyright{} 1996 The American Physical Society.
The four metastable states of atomic barium comprising the
6s5d configuration have been studied by atomic-beam magnetic resonance, and information concerning their
g factors has been obtained. Data from this work agree with that obtained recently by v. Oppen using a different method, and agreement is also obtained with theory.