Long term stability of H atoms in HD-D-2-He solids - Texas A&M University (TAMU) Scholar

We employed en electron spin resonance (ESR) technique for investigating the long term behavior of hydrogen and deuterium atoms in the HD-D2 impurity helium solids that were created by sending a gas mixture [H2]:[D2]:[He] = 1:4:100 through a radio-frequency electrical discharge into a volume of superfluid 4He at T = 1.5 K. H and D atoms were stabilized inside nanoclusters of impurity molecules. The exchange tunneling reactions D + H2 HD + H and D + HD D2 + H proceeded to eliminate D atoms and increase the concentration of H atoms in the HD-D2 impurity-helium solids. Local concentrations of H atoms inside the molecular nanoclusters of order 1020 cm-3 were achieved. The high concentration of H atoms was stable during 40 hours storage of the sample at T = 1.35 K. These solids are possible candidates for collective quantum phenomena of atomic hydrogen if the Bose-Einstein degeneracy regime can be attained. 2005 Springer Science+Business Media, Inc.

Long term stability of H atoms in HD-D-2-He solids Academic Article