Single ion spectroscopy of ytterbium

Recent work is presented on the search for the weak electric octupole transition in a single cold ion of the odd-isotope /sup 171/Yb/sup +/ and includes new /sup 171/Yb/sup +/ spectroscopy on two other reference transitions in the optical and infra-red regions, which are used to locate the octupole transition. A successful observation of this /sup 171/Yb/sup +/ /sup 2/S/sub 1/2/-/sup 2/F/sub 7/2/ reference transition is presented.