A hydrogen ion beam method of molecular density measurement inside a 4.2-K beam tube

In our first experiments on synchrotron radiation-induced photodesorption in a 4.2-K beam tube, the moleculm density was measured by room temperature ion gauges and RGAs outside the beam tube. The molecular density inside the 4.2-K beam tube was therefore unknown, since the mean molecular speed of photodesorbed molecules had not been measured. To determine the density inside the 4.2-K beam tube we have developed a direct method of measurement utilizing the neutralization of H+ beams, which are proportional to gas density. The hydrogen ion beams (up to 20 keV, ∼1 μA) are extracted from an rf ion source and guided into the cold beam tube by a bending magnet. The H0 and H- produced in the beam tube are magnetically separated from H- and detected with secondary electron multipliers (SEMs). Small superconducting dipole magnets located near the center of the beam tube allow a ∼20-cm segment of the injected ion beam to be offset a few mm from the injection axis; detection of H0 and H- produced along this offset segment provides a localized density measurement. If necessary, detector background due to synchrotron radiation photons can be discriminated against by gating the detector on between the bursts of synchrotron radiation. The experimental setup and initial data will be presented