Measurement of the<mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" display="inline"><mml:mn>2</mml:mn><mml:mi>S</mml:mi></mml:math>Hyperfine Interval in Atomic Hydrogen

An optical measurement of the 2S hyperfine interval in atomic hydrogen using two-photon spectroscopy of the 1S-2S transition gives a value of 177 556 834.3(6.7) Hz. The uncertainty is 2.4 times smaller than achieved by our group in 2003 and more than 4 times smaller than for any independent radio-frequency measurement. The specific combination of the 2S and 1S hyperfine intervals predicted by QED theory 8fHFS(2S)-fHFS(1S)=48 953(3) Hz is in good agreement with the value of 48 923(54) Hz obtained from this experiment.