Lorentz and violation and the hydrogen and antihydrogen molecular ions. I. Rovibrational states
Phys. Rev. D 112, 056015 – Published 15 September, 2025
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1103/ng7y-7v34
Abstract
The extremely narrow natural linewidths of rovibrational energy levels in the molecular hydrogen ion , and the prospect of synthesising its antimatter counterpart , make it a promising candidate for high-precision tests of fundamental symmetries such as Lorentz and invariance. In this paper, we present a detailed analysis of the rovibrational spectrum of the (anti)hydrogen molecular ion in a low-energy effective theory incorporating Lorentz and violation. The focus is on the spin-independent couplings in this theory, and especially the odd couplings for which the best current bounds come from measurements of the transition in atomic hydrogen and antihydrogen. We show that in addition to the improvement in these bounds from the increased precision of the transition frequencies, potentially reaching 1 part in , rovibrational transitions in the and molecular ions have an enhanced sensitivity to Lorentz and violation of in the proton (hadron) sector compared to and atomic transitions.