Eur. Phys. J. C (2025) 85: 688
https://doi.org/10.1140/epjc/s10052-025-14396-3

Regular Article - Experimental Physics

Ion transport on phased radiofrequency carpets in xenon gas

¹ Department of Physics, University of Texas at Arlington, 76019, Arlington, TX, USA
² Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Notre Dame, 46556, Notre Dame, IN, USA
³ Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, University of Texas at Arlington, 76019, Arlington, TX, USA
⁴ Argonne National Laboratory, 60439, Argonne, IL, USA
⁵ Department of Physics and Astronomy, Manchester University, M13 9PL, Manchester, UK
⁶ Instituto de Instrumentación para Imagen Molecular (I3M), Centro Mixto CSIC-Universitat Politècnica de València, Camino de Vera s/n, 46022, Valencia, Spain
⁷ Department of Organic Chemistry I, Universidad del Pais Vasco (UPV/EHU), Centro de Innovación en Química Avanzada (ORFEO-CINQA), 20018, San Sebastián/Donostia, Spain
⁸ Donostia International Physics Center, BERC Basque Excellence Research Centre, Manuel de Lardizabal 4, 20018, San Sebastián/Donostia, Spain
⁹ Unit of Nuclear Engineering, Faculty of Engineering Sciences, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, P.O.B. 653, 8410501, Beersheba, Israel
¹⁰ Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL), 99352, Richland, WA, USA
¹¹ Instituto de Física Corpuscular (IFIC), CSIC and Universitat de València, Calle Catedrático José Beltrán, 2, 46980, Paterna, Spain
¹² Institute of Nanostructures, Nanomodelling and Nanofabrication (i3N), Universidade de Aveiro, Campus de Santiago, 3810-193, Aveiro, Portugal
¹³ Department of Physics, Universidad del Pais Vasco (UPV/EHU), PO Box 644, 48080, Bilbao, Spain
¹⁴ Laboratorio Subterráneo de Canfranc, Paseo de los Ayerbe s/n, 22880, Canfranc Estación, Spain
¹⁵ LIP, Department of Physics, University of Coimbra, 3004-516, Coimbra, Portugal
¹⁶ Centro de Física de Materiales (CFM), CSIC and Universidad del Pais Vasco (UPV/EHU), Manuel de Lardizabal 5, 20018, San Sebastián/Donostia, Spain
¹⁷ Department of Physics, Harvard University, 02138, Cambridge, MA, USA
¹⁸ Department of Applied Chemistry, Universidad del Pais Vasco (UPV/EHU), Manuel de Lardizabal 3, 20018, San Sebastián/Donostia, Spain
¹⁹ Instituto Gallego de Física de Altas Energías, Univ. de Santiago de Compostela, Campus sur, Rúa Xosé María Suárez Núñez, s/n, 15782, Santiago de Compostela, Spain
²⁰ LIBPhys, Physics Department, University of Coimbra, Rua Larga, 3004-516, Coimbra, Portugal
²¹ Ikerbasque (Basque Foundation for Science), 48009, Bilbao, Spain
²² Department of Physics and Astronomy, Iowa State University, 50011-3160, Ames, IA, USA
²³ Racah Institute of Physics, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, 9190401, Jerusalem, Israel
²⁴ Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory, 60510, Batavia, IL, USA
²⁵ Escola Politècnica Superior, Universitat de Girona, Av. Montilivi, s/n, 17071, Girona, Spain
²⁶ Weizmann Institute of Science, Rehovot, Israel
²⁷ University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, USA
²⁸ Los Alamos National Laboratory, Los Alamos, USA

^a exd4668@mavs.uta.edu

Received: 20 February 2025
Accepted: 4 June 2025
Published online: 23 June 2025

Abstract

We present the design and performance of a four-phased radiofrequency (RF) carpet system for ion transport between 200–600 mbar, significantly higher than previously demonstrated RF carpet applications. The RF carpet, designed with a 160 $\mathrm{\mu }$m pitch, is applied to the lateral collection of ions in xenon at pressures up to 600 mbar. We demonstrate transport efficiency of caesium ions across varying pressures, and compare with microscopic simulations made in the SIMION package. The novel use of an N-phased RF carpet can achieve ion levitation and controlled lateral motion in a denser environment than is typical for RF ion transport in gases. This feature makes such carpets strong candidates for ion transport to single ion sensors envisaged for future neutrinoless double-beta decay experiments in xenon gas.