We have studied neutron quantum states in the potential well formed by the earth's gravitational field and a horizontal mirror. The estimated characteristic sizes of the neutron wave functions in the two lowest quantum states correspond to expectations with an experimental accuracy. A position-sensitive neutron detector with an extra-high spatial resolution of ~2 microns was developed and tested for this particular experiment, to be used to measure the spatial density distribution in a standing neutron wave above a mirror for a set of some of the lowest quantum states. The present experiment can be used to set an upper limit for an additional short-range fundamental force. We studied methodological uncertainties as well as the feasibility of improving further the accuracy of this experiment.
@article{arxiv.hep-ph/0502081,
title = {Study of the neutron quantum states in the gravity field},
author = {V. V. Nesvizhevsky and A. K. Petukhov and H. G. Boerner and T. A. Baranova and A. M. Gagarski and G. A. Petrov and K. V. Protasov and A. Yu. Voronin and S. Baessler and H. Abele and A. Westphal and L. Lucovac},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:hep-ph/0502081},
year = {2011}
}