Atomic Tritium Production and Trapping for Neutrino Mass Measurement in Project 8

Project 8 is a phased experiment using tritium β decay to investigate the absolute neutrino mass. Good energy precision, high statistics, and well-controlled systematics are required to reach an electron antineutrino mass limit of ≤ 40 meV. Our technique, Cyclotron Radiation Emission Spectroscopy (CRES), has achieved eV-scale resolution at 17.8 keV, near the tritium endpoint. Project 8 was the first to observe the fW-scale radiation from individual electrons. The event rate in CRES scales with volume; we will instrument our fiducial volume with a spatially-resolving antenna array, eliminating pileup. Project 8 will be the first laboratory neutrino mass experiment to use atomic tritium (T). Decay of a T₂ molecule excites rovibrational states that smear the observed energy by 1 eV. The decay of T, however, has an energy smearing of ≤ 0.1 eV. Our baseline calls for trapping 30 mK atomic tritium in a 2-T-deep, 10+-m³ superconducting magnetic bottle. I will discuss our approach to this large-volume atomic CRES experiment, focusing on production and handling techniques for recombination-prone tritium atoms.