The Os$^{16+}$ and Ir$^{17+}$ ions as candidates for accurate optical clock sensitive to physics beyond standard model

TL;DR

This paper identifies Os$^{16+}$ and Ir$^{17+}$ ions as promising candidates for highly accurate optical clocks that are sensitive to new physics beyond the standard model, including variations in fundamental constants and dark matter interactions.

Contribution

The study provides detailed electronic structure calculations for Os$^{16+}$ and Ir$^{17+}$ ions, demonstrating their suitability for precision measurements and tests of fundamental physics.

Findings

Os$^{16+}$ has metastable states suitable for optical clocks.

Calculated spectra of Ir$^{17+}$ agree well with experimental data.

Both ions are promising for detecting physics beyond the standard model.

Abstract

We perform detailed calculations of the electronic structure of the Os$^{16+}$ ion and demonstrate that it has several metastable states which can be used for very accurate optical clocks. The clocks are highly sensitive to manifestations of the physics beyond standard model, such as time variation of the fine structure constant $\alpha$, interaction with scalar and pseudoscalar (axion) dark matter fields, local Lorentz invariance and local position invariance violations, and interaction of atomic electrons with nucleus mediated by new boson. The latter can be studied by analysing King plot for isotope shifts and its possible non-linearities since Os has 5 stable isotopes with zero nuclear spin. Similar calculations for the Ir$^{17+}$ ion spectra demonstrate very good agreement between theory and experiment. This helps to validate the method of the calculations and demonstrate that both ions are excellent candidates for the search of new physics.