English

Atom-interferometric test of the equivalence principle at the $10^{-12}$ level

Atomic Physics 2020-11-06 v2 General Relativity and Quantum Cosmology Quantum Physics

Abstract

Does gravity influence local measurements? We use a dual-species atom interferometer with 2s2\,\text{s} of free-fall time to measure the relative acceleration between 85^{85}Rb and 87^{87}Rb wave packets in the Earth's gravitational field. Systematic errors arising from kinematic differences between the isotopes are suppressed by calibrating the angles and frequencies of the interferometry beams. We find an E\"otv\"os parameter of η=[1.6  ±  1.8  (stat)  ±  3.4  (sys)]×1012\eta = [1.6\; \pm\; 1.8\; \text{(stat)}\; \pm \; 3.4 \; \text{(sys)}] \times 10^{-12}, consistent with zero violation of the equivalence principle. With a resolution of up to 1.4×1011g1.4 \times 10^{-11} \, g per shot, we demonstrate a sensitivity to η\eta of 5.4×1011/Hz5.4 \times 10^{-11}\,/\sqrt{\text{Hz}}.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.2005.11624,
  title  = {Atom-interferometric test of the equivalence principle at the $10^{-12}$ level},
  author = {Peter Asenbaum and Chris Overstreet and Minjeong Kim and Joseph Curti and Mark A. Kasevich},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2005.11624},
  year   = {2020}
}

Comments

8 pages, 6 figures, 1 Table