Related papers: Probing Macroscopic Quantum Superpositions with Na…
Among the known particles, the neutron takes a special position, as it provides experimental access to all four fundamental forces and a wide range of hypothetical interactions. Despite being unstable, free neutrons live long enough to be…
Quantum technologies are developing powerful tools to generate and manipulate coherent superpositions of different energy levels. Envisaging a new generation of energy-efficient quantum devices, here we explore how coherence can be…
Quantum thermodynamics seeks to extend non-equilibrium stochastic thermodynamics to small quantum systems where non-classical features are essential to its description. Such a research area has recently provided meaningful theoretical and…
The superposition principle is one of the most fundamental principles of quantum mechanics. According to the Schr\"odinger equation, a physical system can be in any linear combination of its possible states. While the validity of this…
Recent theory and experiment in crystals of molecular magnets suggest that fundamental tests of the decoherence mechanisms of macroscopic quantum phenomena may be feasible in these systems (which are almost ideal quantum spin glasses). We…
I present a general scheme through which the evidence of a superposition involving distinct classical-like states of a macroscopic system can be probed. The scheme relies on a qubit being coupled to a macroscopic harmonic oscillator in such…
The linear superposition principle in quantum mechanics is essential for several no-go theorems such as the no-cloning theorem, the no-deleting theorem and the no-superposing theorem. It remains an open problem of finding general forbidden…
We describe a new and experimentally feasible protocol for performing fundamental tests of quantum mechanics with massive objects. In our approach a single two level system is used to probe the motion of a nanomechanical resonator via…
We analyse a proposal that we have recently put forward for an interface between matter-wave and optomechanical technologies from the perspective of macroscopic quantumness. In particular, by making use of a measure of macroscopicity in…
Modern quantum engineering techniques enabled successful foundational tests of quantum mechanics. Yet, the universal validity of quantum postulates is an open question. Here we propose a new theoretical framework of Q-data tests, which…
That gravitation can be understood as purely metric phenomenon depends crucially on the validity of a number of hypotheses which are summarised by the Einstein Equivalence Principle, the least well tested part of which being the…
In modern physics only relative quantities are considered to have physical significance. For example, position assigned to a system depends on the choice of coordinates, and only relative distances between different systems have physical…
We assess the most macroscopic matter-wave experiments to date as to the extent to which they probe the quantum-classical boundary by demonstrating interference of heavy molecules and cold atomic ensembles. To this end, we consider a…
We consider an extension of the recent experiment with ultracold neutrons and the quantization of its vertical motion in order to test the Weak Equivalence Principle. We show that an improvement on the energy resolution of the experiment…
Quantum superposition is often phrased as the ability to add state vectors. In practice, however, the physical quantity is a ray (a rank-one projector), so each input specifies only a projector and leaves a gauge freedom in the phases of…
The quantum theory, that we now know, arose in the process of sharp disputes between its creators. One of the results of these disputes was the emergence in recent years of fundamentally new areas of investigation and technology - quantum…
Interferometry with massive particles may have the potential to explore the limitations of standard quantum mechanics in particular where it concerns its boundary with general relativity and the yet to be developed theory of quantum…
What gravitational field is generated by a massive quantum system in a spatial superposition? Despite decades of intensive theoretical and experimental research, we still do not know the answer. On the experimental side, the difficulty lies…
When a massive quantum body is put into a spatial superposition, it is of interest to consider the quantum aspects of the gravitational field sourced by the body. We argue that in order to understand how the body may become entangled with…
Macroscopic realism is the name for a class of modifications to quantum theory that allow macroscopic objects to be described in a measurement-independent manner, while largely preserving a fully quantum mechanical description of the…