Applied Optics Group
Over the past twenty years, members of the UNH Physics Department have been investigating Spin Exchange Optical Pumping (SEOP) to identify new technologies for producing nuclear polarized gases. Originally these efforts were motivated by applications in fundamental physics. Because the lone neutron in 3He dominates the spin and magnetic properties of the composite nucleus, a dense gas of highly polarized 3He can serve as a surrogate neutron target for electron scattering experiments. Also, polarized3He preferentially absorbs neutrons of opposite spin direction allowing volumes of polarized 3He gas to serve as analyzers of neutron polarization in neutron scattering experiments. Read more about Applied Optics Group