Improved Measurement of the Hydrogen1S–2STransition Frequency

Abstract

We have measured the 1S\char21{}2S transition frequency in atomic hydrogen via two-photon spectroscopy on a 5.8~K atomic beam. We obtain f1S\char21{}2S=2\,466\,061\,413\,187\,035\,(10)\,\hskip0.056em\hskip0.056emHz for the hyperfine centroid, in agreement with, but 3.3 times better than the previous result [M. Fischer et~al., Phys. Rev. Lett. 92, 230802 (2004)]. The improvement to a fractional frequency uncertainty of 4.2\ifmmode\times\else\texttimes\fi{}10-15 arises mainly from an improved stability of the spectroscopy laser, and a better determination of the main systematic uncertainties, namely, the second order Doppler and ac and dc Stark shifts. The probe laser frequency was phase coherently linked to the mobile cesium fountain clock FOM via a frequency comb.