A magnetic trap for antihydrogen confinement

The goal of the ALPHA collaboration at CERN is to test CPT conservation by comparing the 1S–2S transitions of hydrogen and antihydrogen. To reach the ultimate accuracy of 1 part in 10 18 , the (anti)atoms must be trapped. Using current technology, only magnetic minimum traps can confine (anti)hydrogen. In this paper, the design of the ALPHA antihydrogen trap and the results of measurements on a prototype system will be presented. The trap depth of the final system will be 1.16 T, corresponding to a temperature of 0.78 K for ground state antihydrogen.