arXiv subjects

A. Lehrach

Publications and source records attributed to A. Lehrach.

At least 19 recordsLinked to original sources

arXiv2026

First Experimental Limit on the Permanent Electric Dipole Moment of the Deuteron

Permanent electric dipole moments (EDMs) provide a sensitive probe of physics beyond the Standard Model and are directly linked to additional sources of CP violation that could explain the matter-antimatter asymmetry of the universe. EDM measurements of charged particles in storage rings rely on detecting a small tilt of the invariant spin axis with respect to the ring plane. In this work, we present the experimental determination of the invariant spin axis of an ensemble of deuterons in the COoler SYnchrotron (COSY), a conventional magnetic storage ring, using a combination of a radio-frequency Wien filter, a superconducting Siberian snake and an electron-cooler solenoid. The measurements reveal tilts of a few milliradians, which are dominated by systematic effects. From the observed tilts, we derive the first experimental limit on the deuteron EDM, $|d^d|< 2.5\cdot10^{-17}\,e\cdot\mathrm{cm} \; (95\%\,\text{ C.L.})$. This result demonstrates the feasibility of using storage rings to search for EDMs of charged stable hadrons and provides a foundation for future dedicated facilities.

nucl-ex↗

arXiv2025

Maintaining a Resonance Condition of an RF Spin Rotator Through a Feedback Loop in a Storage Ring

This paper presents the successful application of a phase-lock feedback system to maintain the resonance condition of a radio frequency (rf) spin rotator (specifically, an rf Wien filter) with respect to a 120 kHz spin precession in the Cooler Synchrotron (COSY) storage ring. Real-time monitoring of the spin precession and the rf Wien filter signal allows the relative phase between the two to be stabilized at an arbitrary setpoint. The feedback system compensates for deviations in the relative phase by adjusting the frequency and/or phase as needed. With this method, a variation in phase relative to the demand phase with a standard deviation of $σ_{Δφ}\approx 0.2\mathrm{rad}$ could be achieved. The system was implemented in two runs aiming at a first direct measurement of the deuteron electric dipole moment in 2018 and 2021. In addition, the difference between a single-bunch beam affected by the spin rotator and a two-bunch system in which only one bunch is exposed to the spin rotator fields is discussed. Both methods have been used during these beam times. The ability to keep the spin precession and the rf fields synchronized is also crucial for future investigations of electric dipole moments of charged particles using storage rings.

physics.acc-ph↗

arXiv2023

Spin decoherence and off-resonance behavior of radiofrequency-driven spin rotations in storage rings

Radiofrequency-driven resonant spin rotators are routinely used as standard instruments in polarization experiments in particle and nuclear physics. Maintaining the continuous exact parametric spin-resonance condition of the equality of the spin rotator and the spin precession frequency during operation constitutes one of the challenges. We present a detailed analytic description of the impact of detuning the exact spin resonance on the vertical and the in-plane precessing components of the polarization. An important part of the formalism presented here is the consideration of experimentally relevant spin-decoherence effects. We discuss applications of the developed formalism to the interpretation of the experimental data on the novel pilot bunch approach to control the spin-resonance condition during the operation of the radiofrequency-driven Wien filter that is used as a spin rotator in the first direct deuteron electric dipole moment measurement at COSY. We emphasize the potential importance of the hitherto unexplored phase of the envelope of the horizontal polarization as an indicator of the stability of the radiofrequency-driven spin rotations in storage rings. The work presented here serves as a satellite publication to the work published concurrently on the proof of principle experiment about the so-called pilot bunch approach that was developed to provide co-magnetometry for the deuteron electric dipole moment experiment at COSY.

physics.acc-ph↗

arXiv2023

Pilot bunch and co-magnetometry of polarized particles stored in a ring

In polarization experiments at storage rings, one of the challenges is to maintain the spin-resonance condition of a radio-frequency spin rotator with the spin-precessions of the orbiting particles. Time-dependent variations of the magnetic fields of ring elements lead to unwanted variations of the spin precession frequency. We report here on a solution to this problem by shielding (or masking) one of the bunches stored in the ring from the high-frequency fields of the spin rotator, so that the masked pilot bunch acts as a co-magnetometer for the other signal bunch, tracking fluctuations in the ring on a time scale of about one second. While the new method was developed primarily for searches of electric dipole moments of charged particles, it may have far-reaching implications for future spin physics facilities, such as the EIC and NICA.

physics.ins-det↗

arXiv2022

Snowmass Whitepaper AF6: Plasma-Based Particle Sources

High-brightness beams generated by particle sources based on advanced accelerator concepts have the potential to become an essential part of future accelerator technology. High-gradient accelerators can generate and rapidly accelerate particle beams to relativistic energies while minimizing irreversible detrimental effects to the beam brightness that occur at low beam energies. Due to the high accelerating gradients, these novel accelerators are also significantly more compact than conventional technology. The beam parameters of these particle sources are largely determined by the injection and subsequent acceleration processes. While there has been significant progress crucial parameters that are required for a future collider or more near-term applications, including X-ray free-electron lasers (XFELs), such as a sufficiently small energy spread and small emittance for bunches with a high charge and at high pulse repetition rate. Major research and development efforts are required to realize these approaches for a front-end injector for a future collider in order to address these limitations. In particular, this includes methods to control and manipulate the phase-space and spin degrees-of-freedom of ultrashort LWFA electron bunches with high accuracy, methods that increase the laser-to-electron beam efficiency and increased repetition rate. This also includes the development of high-resolution diagnostics, such as full 6D phase-space measurements, beam polarimetry and high-fidelity simulation tools. A further increase in beam luminosity can be achieve through emittance damping. For future colliders, the damping rings might be replaced by a substantially more compact plasma-based approach. Here, plasma wigglers are used to achieve similar damping performance but over a two orders of magnitude reduced length.

physics.acc-ph↗

arXiv2021

First detection of collective oscillations of a stored deuteron beam with an amplitude close to the quantum limit

We investigated coherent betatron oscillations of a deuteron beam in the storage ring COSY, excited by a detuned radio-frequency Wien filter. The beam oscillations were detected by conventional beam position monitors. With the currently available apparatus, we show that oscillation amplitudes down to \SI{1}{\micro \meter} can be detected. The interpretation of the response of the stored beam to the detuned radio-frequency Wien filter is based on simulations of the beam evolution in the lattice of the ring and realistic time-dependent 3D field maps of the Wien filter. Future measurements of the electric dipole moment of protons will, however, require control of the relative position of counter-propagating beams in the sub-picometer range. Since here the stored beam can be considered as a rarefied gas of uncorrelated particles, we moreover demonstrate that the amplitudes of the zero-point (ground state) betatron oscillations of individual particles are only a factor of about 10 larger than the Heisenberg uncertainty limit. As a consequence of this, we conclude that quantum mechanics does not preclude the control of the beam centroids to sub-picometer accuracy. The smallest Lorentz force exerted on a single particle that we have been able to determine is \SI{10}{aN}.

nucl-ex↗

arXiv2021

Spin Physics at COSY (2021-2024 and beyond) -- Pathfinder investigations toward an EDM storage ring and Spin-for-FAIR

The unique global feature of COSY is its ability to accelerate, store and manipulate polarized proton and deuteron beams. In the recent past, these beams have been used primarily for precision measurements, in particular in connection with the study of charged particle EDMs (Electric Dipole Moment) in storage rings. The role of COSY as a R&D facility and for initial (static and oscillating) EDM measurements can hardly be overestimated. Unfortunately, as a consequence of the strategic decisions of Forschungszentrum Jülich and the subsequent "TransFAIR" agreement between FZJ and GSI Darmstadt, it is currently planned to stop the operation of COSY by the end of 2024. The various groups working with polarized beams at COSY felt it important to collect information on essential measurements to be performed until the termination of machine operation. These experiments, briefly described in this document along with an estimate of the beam time required, serve as pathfinder investigations toward an EDM storage ring and Spin for FAIR.

physics.acc-ph↗

arXiv2021

Storage Ring to Search for Electric Dipole Moments of Charged Particles -- Feasibility Study

The proposed method exploits charged particles confined as a storage ring beam (proton, deuteron, possibly $^3$He) to search for an intrinsic electric dipole moment (EDM) aligned along the particle spin axis. Statistical sensitivities could approach 10$^{-29}$ e$\cdot$cm. The challenge will be to reduce systematic errors to similar levels. The ring will be adjusted to preserve the spin polarisation, initially parallel to the particle velocity, for times in excess of 15 minutes. Large radial electric fields, acting through the EDM, will rotate the polarisation from the longitudinal to the vertical direction. The slow rise in the vertical polarisation component, detected through scattering from a target, signals the EDM. The project strategy is outlined. A stepwise plan is foreseen, starting with ongoing COSY activities that demonstrate technical feasibility. Achievements to date include reduced polarization measurement errors, long horizontal plane polarization lifetimes, and control of the polarization direction through feedback from scattering measurements. The project continues with a proof-of-capability measurement (precursor experiment; first direct deuteron EDM measurement), an intermediate prototype ring (proof-of-principle; demonstrator for key technologies), and finally a high-precision electric-field storage ring.

hep-ex↗

arXiv2020

Beam-based alignment at the Cooler Synchrotron COSY as a prerequisite for an electric dipole moment measurement

The Jülich Electric Dipole moment Investigation (JEDI) collaboration aims at a direct measurement of the Electric Dipole Moment (EDM) of protons and deuterons using a storage ring. The measurement is based on a polarization measurement. In order to reach highest accuracy, one has to know the exact trajectory through the magnets, especially the quadrupoles, to avoid the influence of magnetic fields on the polarization vector. In this paper, the development of a beam-based alignment technique is described that was developed and implemented at the COoler SYnchrotron (COSY) at Forschungszentrum Jülich. Well aligned quadrupoles permit one to absolutely calibrate the Beam Position Monitors (BPMs). The method is based on the fact that a particle beam, which does not pass through the center of a quadrupole, experiences a deflection. The precision reached by the method is approximately 40 micro meter. Some consequences for the design of a new high precision storage ring for EDM mesasurements are discussed.

physics.acc-ph↗

arXiv2020

Influence of electron cooling on the polarization lifetime of a horizontally polarized storage ring beam

A previous publication has shown that the in-plane polarization (IPP) component of a polarized 0.97-GeV/c deuteron beam in the COSY storage ring may acquire a polarization half-life in excess of 1000 s through a combination of beam bunching, electron cooling (prior to any spin manipulation), sextupole field adjustment, and a limitation of the beam intensity. This paper documents further tests pointing to additional gains in the IPP lifetime if cooling is active throughout the beam store.

physics.acc-ph↗

arXiv2020

Exploiting the Planck-Einstein Relation

The origin of quantum physics was the discovery of the base unit of electromagnetic action $h$ by Max Planck in 1900 when he analyzed the experimental results of the black body radiation. This permitted Albert Einstein a few years later to explain the photoelectric effect by the absorption of photons with an energy of $E = h \cdot f$. We exploit the Planck-Einstein relation in a new type of fundamental spectroscopic measurements of direct transitions between two states with energy differences of about 10 neV and induced frequencies of a few MHz. Employing a Lamb-shift polarimeter and a Sona transition unit, featuring a relatively simple magnetic field configuration of two opposing solenoidal coils, we were able to determine $f$ and measure $E$ independently. Only resonances corresponding to integer multiples of Planck's constant $h$ were observed in our setup, which can very well be explained quantitatively by the Schrödinger equation. This new method beautifully demonstrates the quantization in the micro-cosmos and allows one to measure the hyperfine splitting energies between the substates with $F=1$ and $m_F = -1, 0, +1$ of metastable hydrogen atoms as function of a magnetic field and, thus, to investigate the influence of QED corrections on the Breit-Rabi diagram.

physics.atom-ph↗

arXiv2020

A New Beam Polarimeter at COSY to Search for Electric Dipole Moments of Charged Particles

A calorimetric polarimeter based on inorganic LYSO scintillators is described. It has been designed for use in a storage ring to search for electric dipole moments (EDM) of charged particles such as the proton and deuteron. Its development and first use was on the Cooler Synchrotron (COSY) at the Forschungszentrum Jülich with 0.97 GeV/c polarized deuterons, a particle and energy suitable for an EDM search. The search requires a polarimeter with high efficiency, large analyzing power, and stable operating characteristics. With typical beam momenta of about 1 GeV/c, the scattering of protons or deuterons from a carbon target into forward angles becomes a nearly optimal choice of an analyzing reaction. The polarimeter described here consists of 52 LYSO detector modules, arranged in 4 symmetric blocks (up, down, left, right) for energy determination behind plastic scintillators for particle identification via energy loss. The commissioning results of the current setup demonstrate that the polarimeter is ready to be employed in a first direct search for an EDM on the deuteron, which is planned at COSY in the next two years.

physics.ins-det↗

arXiv2020

Measurement of deuteron carbon vector analyzing powers in the kinetic energy range 170-380 MeV

A measurement of vector analyzing powers in elastic deuteron-carbon scattering has been performed at the Cooler Synchrotron COSY of Forschungszentrum Jülich, Germany. Seven kinetic beam energies between 170 and 380 MeV have been used. A vector-polarized beam from a polarized deuteron source was injected, accelerated to the final desired energy and stored in COSY. A thin needle-shaped diamond strip was used as a carbon target, onto which the beam was slowly steered. Elastically scattered deuterons were identified in the forward direction using various layers of scintillators and straw tubes. Where data exist in the literature (at 200 and 270 MeV), excellent agreement of the angular shape was found. The beam polarization of the presented data was deduced by fitting the absolute scale of the analyzing power to these references. Our results extend the world data set and are necessary for polarimetry of future electric dipole moment searches at storage rings. They will as well serve as an input for theoretical description of polarized hadron-hadron scattering.

nucl-ex↗

arXiv2020

Total and differential cross sections of the $\boldsymbol{dp\to {}^3}\textrm{He}\,\boldsymbolη$ reaction at excess energies between 1 and 15 MeV

New high precision total and differential cross sections are reported for the $dp\to {}^3\textrm{He}\,η$ reaction close to threshold. The measurements were performed using the magnetic spectrometer ANKE, which is an internal fixed target facility at the COSY cooler synchrotron. The data were taken for deuteron beam momenta between $3.14641~\textrm{GeV}/c$ and $3.20416~\textrm{GeV}/c$, which corresponds to the range in excess energy $Q$ for this reaction between $1.14~\textrm{MeV}$ and $15.01~\textrm{MeV}$. The normalization was established through the measurement in parallel of deuteron-proton elastic scattering and this was checked through the study of the $dp\to {}^3\textrm{He}\,π^0$ reaction. The previously indicated possible change of sign of the slope of the differential cross sections near the production threshold, which could be explained by a rapid variation of the $s$- and $p$-wave interference term, is not confirmed by the new data. The energy dependence of the total cross section and the $90^{\circ}$ slope parameter are well explained by describing the final state interaction in terms of a complex Jost function and the results are significant in the discussion of $η$-mesic nuclei. In combination with recently published WASA-at-COSY data [P. Adlarson $et\, al.$, Phys. Lett. B 782, 297 (2018)], a smooth variation of the slope parameter is achieved up to an excess energy of $80.9~\textrm{MeV}$.

nucl-ex↗

arXiv2019

Feasibility Study for an EDM Storage Ring

This project exploits charged particles confined as a storage ring beam (proton, deuteron, possibly $^3$He) to search for an intrinsic electric dipole moment (EDM, $\vec d$) aligned along the particle spin axis. Statistical sensitivities can approach $10^{-29}$~e$\cdot$cm. The challenge will be to reduce systematic errors to similar levels. The ring will be adjusted to preserve the spin polarization, initially parallel to the particle velocity, for times in excess of 15 minutes. Large radial electric fields, acting through the EDM, will rotate the polarization ($\vec d \times\vec E$). The slow rise in the vertical polarization component, detected through scattering from a target, signals the EDM. The project strategy is outlined. It foresees a step-wise plan, starting with ongoing COSY activities that demonstrate technical feasibility. Achievements to date include reduced polarization measurement errors, long horizontal-plane polarization lifetimes, and control of the polarization direction through feedback from the scattering measurements. The project continues with a proof-of-capability measurement (precursor experiment; first direct deuteron EDM measurement), an intermediate prototype ring (proof-of-principle; demonstrator for key technologies), and finally the high precision electric-field storage ring.

physics.acc-ph↗

arXiv2018

Measurement of the analyzing powers in pd elastic and pn quasi-elastic scattering at small angles

The analyzing powers in proton-deuteron elastic and proton-neutron quasi-elastic scattering have been measured at small angles using a polarized proton beam at the COSY storage ring incident on an unpolarized deuterium target. The data were taken at 796MeV and five higher energies from 1600MeV to 2400MeV. The analyzing power in pd elastic scattering was studied by detecting the low energy recoil deuteron in telescopes placed symmetrically in the COSY plane to the left and right of the beam whereas for pn quasi-elastic scattering a low energy proton was registered in one of the telescopes in coincidence with a fast scattered proton measured in the ANKE magnetic spectrometer. Though the experiment explores new domains, the results are consistent with the limited published information.

nucl-ex↗

arXiv2018

Experimental and theoretical study of deuteron-proton elastic scattering for proton kinetic energies between $T_p = 882.2\;\textrm{MeV}$ and $T_p = 918.3\;\textrm{MeV}$

New precise unpolarised differential cross sections of deuteron-proton elastic scattering have been measured at 16 different deuteron beam momenta between $p_d = 3120.17\;\textrm{MeV}/c$ and $p_d =3204.16\;\textrm{MeV}/c$ at the COoler SYnchrotron COSY of the Forschungszentrum Jülich. The data, which were taken using the magnetic spectrometer ANKE, cover the equivalent range in proton kinetic energies from $T_p = 882.2\;\textrm{MeV}$ to $T_p = 918.3\;\textrm{MeV}$. The experimental results are analysed theoretically using the Glauber diffraction model with accurate nucleon-nucleon input. The theoretical cross section at $T_p = 900\;\textrm{MeV}$ agrees very well with the experimental one at low momentum transfers $|t| <0.2\;(\textrm{GeV}/c)^2$.

nucl-ex↗

arXiv2018

Deuteron analysing powers in deuteron-proton elastic scattering at 1.2 and 2.27 GeV

The vector and tensor analysing powers in deuteron-proton elastic scattering have been measured in the forward hemisphere at deuteron kinetic energies of 1.2 GeV and 2.27 GeV using the ANKE spectrometer at the COSY storage ring. The results are compared with other experimental data and with predictions made within the framework of Glauber multiple scattering theory.

nucl-ex↗