Polarized 3He− ion source with hyperfine state selection

High beam polarization is essential to the scientific productivity of a collider. Polarized 3He ions are an essential part of the nuclear physics programs at existing and future ion-ion and electron-ion colliders such as BNL's RHIC and eRHIC and JLab's ELIC. Ion sources with performance exceeding that achieved today are a key requirement for the development of these next generation high-luminosity high-polarization colliders. The development of high-intensity high-brightness arc-discharge ion sources at the Budker Institute of Nuclear Physics (BINP) has opened up an opportunity for realization of a new type of a polarized 3He− ion source. This report discusses a polarized 3He− ion source based on the large difference of extra-electron auto-detachment lifetimes of the different 3He− ion hyperfine states. The highest momentum state of 5/2 has the largest lifetime of τ ∼ 350 µs while the lower momentum states have lifetimes of τ ~ 10 µs. By producing 3He− ion beam composed of only the |5/2, ±5/2> hyperfine s...