{"id":209843,"date":"2025-03-27T02:22:01","date_gmt":"2025-03-27T07:22:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2025\/03\/a-new-benchmark-for-quantum-electrodynamics-in-atoms-precision-measurement-of-boron-like-tin-ions-g-factor"},"modified":"2025-03-27T02:22:01","modified_gmt":"2025-03-27T07:22:01","slug":"a-new-benchmark-for-quantum-electrodynamics-in-atoms-precision-measurement-of-boron-like-tin-ions-g-factor","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2025\/03\/a-new-benchmark-for-quantum-electrodynamics-in-atoms-precision-measurement-of-boron-like-tin-ions-g-factor","title":{"rendered":"A new benchmark for quantum electrodynamics in atoms: Precision measurement of boron-like tin ion\u2019s g factor"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a class=\"aligncenter blog-photo\" href=\"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog.images\/a-new-benchmark-for-quantum-electrodynamics-in-atoms-precision-measurement-of-boron-like-tin-ions-g-factor.jpg\"><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Highly charged heavy ions form a very suitable experimental field for investigating quantum electrodynamics (QED), the best-tested theory in physics describing all electrical and magnetic interactions of light and matter. A crucial property of the electron within QED is the so-called g factor, which precisely characterizes how the particle behaves in a magnetic field.<\/p>\n<p>Recently, the ALPHATRAP group led by Sven Sturm in the division of Klaus Blaum at the Max-Planck-Institut f\u00fcr Kernphysik (MPIK) in Heidelberg measured the g factor of hydrogen-like tin ions on a precision level of 0.5 parts per billion, which is like measuring the distance from Cologne to Frankfurt with precision down to the thickness of a human hair. This is a stringent test of QED for the simplest atomic system, just like conventional hydrogen but with a much higher electric field experienced by the electron due to the charge of 50 protons inside the tin nucleus.<\/p>\n<p>In a new study <a href=\"https:\/\/link.aps.org\/doi\/10.1103\/PhysRevLett.134.123201\" target=\"_blank\">published<\/a> in <i>Physical Review Letters<\/i>, researchers have now tackled highly charged boron-like tin ions with only five remaining electrons. The goal is to study the inter-electronic effects in the boron-like configuration. So far, the only boron-like g factor has been measured with high precision for argon ions with a proton number Z of 18. However, the nucleus is not a point charge like the electron and its charge distribution leads to finite nuclear size corrections\u2014another challenge for precision experiments.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Highly charged heavy ions form a very suitable experimental field for investigating quantum electrodynamics (QED), the best-tested theory in physics describing all electrical and magnetic interactions of light and matter. A crucial property of the electron within QED is the so-called g factor, which precisely characterizes how the particle behaves in a magnetic field. Recently, [\u2026]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":427,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[48,1617],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-209843","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-particle-physics","category-quantum-physics"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/209843","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/427"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=209843"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/209843\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=209843"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=209843"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=209843"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}