Abstract

Recent advances in pulsed muon beams¹ and the production of thermal muons in vacuum^2,3 have made possible the possibility to do precision laser spectroscopy on muonium, the bound state of a positive muon and electron. High resolution laser spectroscopy of muonium is particularly attractive since the atom is one of the simplest systems for testing quantum electrodynamics. The structureless muon allows the energy levels of this atom to be calculated more accurately than those of hydrogen. Positronium is also free of uncertainties in nuclear structure effects, but the relativistic two-body problem presents a formidable caleulational challenge.

© 1988 Optical Society of America