Direct Search for Low Energy Nuclear Isomeric Transition of Th-229m With TES Detector

Precise knowledge of the energy and lifetime of
^229m
Th isomeric state has notable importance as a basis for a nuclear clock. Such a clock would be capable to extend precision on the oscillator frequency by up to four orders of magnitude compared to the presently best atomic clocks. However, the technique proposed for the clock requires that the isomeric state energy is accessible with existing laser systems. Previous measurement placed this state at ∼8 eV (150 nm), in the Vacuum Ultra Violet (VUV) range of the electromagnetic spectrum. A precise direct measurement of the energy of this state is necessary to determine whether the nuclear clock can be made using existing laser technology. We are developing a cryogenic microcalorimeter to measure the energy and lifetime of the
^229m
Th isomeric state directly. The experiment will use a
²³³
U source whose alpha-decay will populate the
^229m
Th isomeric state with 2% probability. The subsequent decay of
^229m
Th will be measured by a Transition Edge Sensor (TES) with <1 eV resolution. Such a technique will allow to observe all possible types of decays of
^229m
Th in the range of energy from 3 to 50 eV and lifetimes >5 microseconds. The single-photon TES has sufficient resolving power combined with high efficiency in the whole energy band for this experiment. Here we present a prototype of TES based on a 200 nm thick iridium-gold (Ir/Au) film which was tested with a pulsed laser source and demonstrated ∼0.8 eV energy resolution and 5.8 ± 2.1 μs signal recovery time.