Continuous-wave laser absorption spectroscopy of the thorium-229 nucleus

Morawetz, I.; Riebner, T.; Toscani De Col, L.; Schneider, F.; Sempelmann, N.; Schaden, F.; Bartokos, M.; Kazakov, G. A.; Lahs, S.; Beeks, K.; Gerstenecker, B.; Grüneis, A.; Pimon, M.; Schumm, T.; Lal, Vishal; Zitzer, Gregor-Alexander; Petrov, V.; Tiedau, Johannes; Okhapkin, Maksim V.; Peik, Ekkehard

doi:https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-026-11011-7

25 von 22699

Zugriffsnummer	56775
Dokumenttyp	Zeitschriftenartikel
Peer Review	mit Peer Review
Sprache	Englisch
Titel	Continuous-wave laser absorption spectroscopy of the thorium-229 nucleus
Autor(in); Institution	Morawetz, I.; Vienna Center for Quantum Science and Technology, Atominstitut, TU Wien, Vienna, AUSTRIA Riebner, T.; Vienna Center for Quantum Science and Technology, Atominstitut, TU Wien, Vienna, AUSTRIA; Bundesamt für Eich- und Vermessungswesen (BEV), Vienna, AUSTRIA Toscani De Col, L.; Vienna Center for Quantum Science and Technology, Atominstitut, TU Wien, Vienna, AUSTRIA Schneider, F.; Vienna Center for Quantum Science and Technology, Atominstitut, TU Wien, Vienna, AUSTRIA Sempelmann, N.; Vienna Center for Quantum Science and Technology, Atominstitut, TU Wien, Vienna, AUSTRIA Schaden, F.; Vienna Center for Quantum Science and Technology, Atominstitut, TU Wien, Vienna, AUSTRIA Bartokos, M.; Vienna Center for Quantum Science and Technology, Atominstitut, TU Wien, Vienna, AUSTRIA Kazakov, G. A.; Vienna Center for Quantum Science and Technology, Atominstitut, TU Wien, Vienna, AUSTRIA Lahs, S.; Vienna Center for Quantum Science and Technology, Atominstitut, TU Wien, Vienna, AUSTRIA Beeks, K.; Vienna Center for Quantum Science and Technology, Atominstitut, TU Wien, Vienna, AUSTRIA Gerstenecker, B.; Vienna Center for Quantum Science and Technology, Atominstitut, TU Wien, Vienna, AUSTRIA Grüneis, A.; Vienna Center for Quantum Science and Technology, Atominstitut, TU Wien, Vienna, AUSTRIA Pimon, M.; Vienna Center for Quantum Science and Technology, Atominstitut, TU Wien, Vienna, AUSTRIA Schumm, T.; Vienna Center for Quantum Science and Technology, Atominstitut, TU Wien, Vienna, AUSTRIA Lal, Vishal; 4.4, Zeit und Frequenz, PTB-Braunschweig Zitzer, Gregor-Alexander; 4.4, Zeit und Frequenz, PTB-Braunschweig Petrov, V.; Max-Born-Institute for Nonlinear Optics and Ultrafast Spectroscopy, Berlin, GERMANY Tiedau, Johannes; 4.4, Zeit und Frequenz, PTB-Braunschweig Okhapkin, Maksim V.; 4.4, Zeit und Frequenz, PTB-Braunschweig Peik, Ekkehard; 4.4, Zeit und Frequenz, PTB-Braunschweig
Quelle/Jahr	Nature: 657 (2026), 626 - 631
ISSN	0028-0836 (print) ; 1476-4687 (online)
DOI	https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-026-11011-7
URL	https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-026-11011-7
Verlag	London [u.a.]: Nature Publ. Group
Zusammenfassung	The low-energy nuclear transition in thorium-229 (Th-229) has been excited in thorium-doped crystals with laser light, opening the path towards a highly stable and robust solid-state optical nuclear clock. The required laser radiation at 148-nm wavelength has so far been produced using pulsed laser systems, in which only a small fraction of the incident photons has been resonant with the narrow nuclear transition. Here we show that the nucleus can be excited with a continuous-wave (CW), narrow-bandwidth, solid-state laser source at sub-nanowatt power and that the nuclear resonance signal can be detected in absorption rather than fluorescence. This eliminates the slow nuclear fluorescence decay from the detection process, allowing for clock operation with fast signal acquisition. We characterize two different thorium centres in a calcium fluoride (CaF₂) crystal and measure the isomeric shift between them. One of the centres shows a very small static electric crystal field gradient <0.1 V Å⁻² compared with gradients in the range of 100 V Å⁻² observed previously. This indicates a centre with high symmetry of the ions surrounding the thorium nucleus, promising nuclear resonance lines that are nearly independent of the lattice spacing.

Kostenfreier Zugang	Open Access Hybrid
Rechteinformation	CC BY 4.0 ; Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License

Forschungsprojekt	23FUN03: HIOC: High-accuracy ion-based optical clocks Part of this work has been financed by the European Research Council (ERC) under the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme (grant agreement nos. 856415 and 101087184) and the Austrian Science Fund (FWF) (grant DOIs: 10.55776/F1004, 10.55776/J4834, 10.55776/PIN9526523). We acknowledge support from the Österreichische Nationalstiftung für Forschung, Technologie und Entwicklung (AQUnet project), from the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - SFB 1227 - Project-ID 274200144 (Project B04) and from the Max-Planck-RIKEN-PTB-Center for Time, Constants and Fundamental Symmetries. The project 23FUN03 HIOC (grant DOI: 10.13039/100019599) has received support from the European Partnership on Metrology, co-financed from the European Union’s Horizon Europe Research and Innovation Program and by the Participating States. The Vienna team acknowledges financing by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) under grant number HR0011-25-2-0031. Open access funding provided by TU Wien (TUW).
Förderinformationen (1)	Förderername: European Research Council (ERC) Förderer ID: 0000 0000 8923 0953 Förderer ID Typ: ISNI Förderprogramm: European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme Förderungsnummer: grant agreement nos. 856415 and 101087184
Förderinformationen (2)	Förderername: Austrian Science Fund (FWF) Förderer ID: 0000 0001 1091 8438 Förderer ID Typ: ISNI URI der Förderung: https://www.doi.org/10.55776/F1004; https://www.doi.org/10.55776/J4834; https://www.doi.org/10.55776/PIN9526523
Förderinformationen (3)	Förderername: EURAMET Förderprogramm: EPM 2023 Fundamental Titel der Förderung: 23FUN03: HIOC: High-accuracy ion-based optical clocks URI der Förderung: https://www.ptb.de/epm2023/hioc/home

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Morawetz, I., Riebner, T., Toscani De Col, L., Schneider, F., Sempelmann, N., Schaden, F., Bartokos, M., Kazakov, G. A., Lahs, S., Beeks, K., Gerstenecker, B., Grüneis, A., Pimon, M., Schumm, T., Lal, V., Zitzer, G.-A., Petrov, V., Tiedau, J., Okhapkin, M. V., & Peik, E. (2026). Continuous-wave laser absorption spectroscopy of the thorium-229 nucleus. Nature, 657, 626–631. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-026-11011-7

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