Development of laser ablation ion sources for Ba-tagging with nEXO

The nEXO collaboration is pursuing various approaches to Ba-tagging as future upgrades to the nEXO detector. Ba-tagging may allow for the unambiguous identification of a candidate 0nbb event as a true bb decay. One approach is comprised of multiple ion-manipulation devices to transport, trap, and identify ions extracted from a high pressure Xe-gas environment. To characterize the performance of the system, two laser ablation ion sources (LASs) are being developed, that can operate in vacuum and in Xe-gas respectively. Ion bunches produced by laser-ablation of the target surface can be used to characterize ion extraction and identification capabilities of the Ba-tagging system. Both ion sources have been tested in vacuum conditions and ion currents from a target surface were measured. The in-gas LAS is ready to be commissioned at high pressure. The ion sources and their status will be presented.