Erratum: "Sub-kelvin temperature management in ion traps for optical clocks" [Rev. Sci. Instrum. 91, 111301 (2020)]

Atomization, converting samples into gas-phase atoms and ions, is essential for atomic spectroscopy. The flame temperature required for atomization affects the efficiency of the atomic spectroscopic methods by increasing the atomization efficiency and the relative population of the excited and ground states.
At thermal equilibrium, the relative populations of excited and ground state atoms can be estimated using the Maxwell–Boltzmann distribution. For example, an increase in temperature...

Near absolute zero temperatures, in the presence of a magnetic field, the majority of nuclei prefer the lower energy spin-up state to the higher energy spin-down state. As temperatures increase, the energy from thermal collisions distributes the spins more equally between the two states. The Boltzmann distribution equation gives the ratio of the number of spins predicted in the spin −½ (N−) and spin +½ (N+) states.