Production and trapping of carbon clusters for absolute mass measurements at ISOLTRAP

Abstract Singly-charged carbon clusters C n + ( n ⩾1) have been produced by laser-induced desorption and fragmentation of C 60 fullerenes and have been injected into and stored in the Penning trap system of the ISOLTRAP mass spectrometer at ISOLDE/CERN. The present study is the first step to extend the until now direct mass measurements at ISOLTRAP to absolute mass measurements by using clusters of 12 C.