Related papers: Decoherence from Long-Range Forces in Atom Interfe…
If dark energy --- which drives the accelerated expansion of the universe --- consists of a light scalar field, it might be detectable as a "fifth force" between normal-matter objects, in potential conflict with precision tests of gravity.…
We report on a study of the dynamics of decoherence of a matter-wave interferometer, consisting of a pair of low-dimensional cold atom condensates at finite temperature. We identify two distinct regimes in the time dependence of the…
Atom interferometry tests of universality of free fall based on the differential measurement of two different atomic species provide a useful complement to those based on macroscopic masses. However, when striving for the highest possible…
Quantum coherence is a fundamental characteristic to distinguish quantum systems from their classical counterparts. Though quantum coherence persists in isolated non-interacting systems, interactions inevitably lead to decoherence, which is…
The unprecedented precision of atom interferometry will soon lead to laboratory tests of general relativity to levels that will rival or exceed those reached by astrophysical observations. We propose such an experiment that will initially…
Real world quantum systems are open to perpetual influence from the wider environment. Quantum gravitational fluctuations provide a most fundamental source of the environmental influence through their universal interactions with all forms…
Quantum reflection occurs when ultra-cold atoms are incident on a material surface with sufficiently low velocity. The reflecting matter wave can interfere with the incident wave to form a detectable pattern, and this pattern contains…
Optics and interferometry with matter waves is the art of coherently manipulating the translational motion of particles like neutrons, atoms and molecules. Coherent atom optics is an extension of techniques that were developed for…
We review the tantalising prospect that the first evidence for the dark energy driving the observed acceleration of the Universe on giga-parsec scales may be found through metre scale laboratory based atom interferometry experiments. To do…
Complexity in materials often arises from competing interactions at the atomic length scale. One such example are the strongly correlated heavy-fermion materials where the competition between Kondo screening and antiferromagnetic ordering…
Various models have been proposed in which the Schr\"odinger equation is modified to account for a decay of spatial coherences of massive objects. While optomechanical systems and matter-wave interferometry with large clusters are promising…
Long-time atom interferometry is instrumental to various high-precision measurements of fundamental physical properties, including tests of the equivalence principle. Due to rotations and gravity gradients, the classical trajectories…
It has recently been proposed that quantum gravity might lead to the decoherence of superpositions in energy, corresponding to a discretization of time at the Planck scale. At first sight the proposal seems amenable to experimental…
Environment-induced decoherence and superselection have been a subject of intensive research over the past two decades, yet their implications for the foundational problems of quantum mechanics, most notably the quantum measurement problem,…
We present results from exploratory studies, supported by the Physics Beyond Colliders (PBC) Study Group, of the suitability of a CERN site and its infrastructure for hosting a vertical atom interferometer (AI) with a baseline of about 100…
One of the biggest problems faced by those attempting to combine quantum theory and general relativity is the experimental inaccessibility of the unification scale. In this paper we show how incoherent conformal waves in the gravitational…
Quantum superposition is central to quantum theory but challenges our concepts of reality and spacetime when applied to macroscopic objects like Schr\"odinger's cat. For that reason, it has been a long-standing question whether quantum…
The quite different behaviors exhibited by microscopic and macroscopic systems with respect to quantum interferences suggest the existence of a borderline beyond which quantum systems loose their coherences and can be described classically.…
We study the impact of many-body effects on the fundamental precision limits in quantum metrology. On the one hand such effects may lead to non-linear Hamiltonians, studied in the field of non-linear quantum metrology, while on the other…
Light-pulse atom interferometers serve as tools for high-precision metrology and are targeting measurements of relativistic effects. This development is facilitated by extended interrogation times and large-momentum-transfer techniques…