Hertzian spectroscopy application to excited states in accelerated ion beams

It is shown that accelerated ion beams enables the application of optical hertzian spectrometry methods to be extended to research on the excited states of free ionic systems. The photon beat method has proved especially simple to apply in beam foil geometry because of the unidirectional beam velocity while the beam gas device is suitable for experiments of the energy level crossing type. Only the resonance technique involving direct application of high-frequency magnetic fields poses serious problems because of the high HF powers necessary. So far structure intervals have been measured in ions carrying up to three charges (seven in the special case of Lamb shift measurements) with a precision of a few percent. The interest of these structure studies in free ions is emphasized particularly. The study of hydrogen-like or helium-like ions of high Z allows the fundamental calculations of quantum electrodynamics to be checked with regard to the Lamb shift or the spontaneous emission theory. In more complex electronic systems, optical spectroscopy of accelerated ion beams gives wavelengths with a resolution reaching 10-5, lifetimes with an accuracy better than 10% when the cascade effects are properly studied, and Lande factors with a precision of several % under present technical conditions. The photon beat method concerns hyperfine nuclear effects in light atoms of Z<=20. Another line of research study the hyperfine structure of a given configuration in an isoelectronic sequence