Related papers: Contrast Loss from Astrophysical Backgrounds in Sp…
Atom interferometers provide a powerful means of realizing quantum coherent systems with increasingly macroscopic extent in space and time. These systems provide an opportunity for a variety of novel tests of fundamental physics, including…
High contrast matter-wave interferometry is essential in various fundamental quantum mechanical experiments as well as for technical applications. Thereby, contrast and sensitivity are typically reduced by decoherence and dephasing effects.…
Decoherence due to scattering from background gas particles is observed for the first time in a Mach-Zehnder atom interferometer, and compared with decoherence due to scattering photons. A single theory is shown to describe decoherence due…
We study how coherent scattering of a background gas off an atom (or other matter) interferometer can lead to enhanced signals from phase shifts and contrast loss. We focus on the inclusion of realistic features of atom interferometers such…
We present a comprehensive theoretical analysis of neutrino-induced decoherence in macroscopic matter-wave interferometry experiments designed to search for dark matter and beyond-Standard Model physics. Our calculation includes…
Dark matter interactions with electrons or protons during the early Universe leave imprints on the cosmic microwave background and the matter power spectrum, and can be probed through cosmological and astrophysical observations. These…
The coherence effects induced by external photons coupled to matter waves inside a Mach-Zehnder three-grating interferometer are analyzed. Alternatively to atom-photon entanglement scenarios, the model considered here only relies on the…
Atom interferometers measure quantum interference patterns in the wave functions of cold atoms that follow superpositions of different space-time trajectories. These can be sensitive to phase shifts induced by fundamental physics processes…
We study the decoherence of atomic interferometers due to the scattering of stochastic gravitational waves. We evaluate the `direct' gravitational effect registered by the phase of the matter waves as well as the `indirect' effect…
Although various pieces of indirect evidence about the nature of dark matter have been collected, its direct detection has eluded experimental searches despite extensive effort. If the mass of dark matter is below 1 MeV, it is essentially…
Ultralight particles, with a mass below the electronvolt scale, exhibit wave-like behavior and have arisen as a compelling dark matter candidate. A particularly intriguing subclass is scalar dark matter, which induces variations in…
In this paper we discuss how the Cosmic Neutrino Background can affect the measured phase difference in a matter interferometer. This phase is proportional to a difference in potential energies along the two interferometer paths. The…
We study the loss of spatial coherence in the extended wave function of fullerenes due to collisions with background gases. From the gradual suppression of quantum interference with increasing gas pressure we are able to support…
We study the decoherence of a system of $N$ non-interacting heavy particles (atoms) due to coherent scattering with a background gas. We introduce a framework for computing the induced phase shift and loss of contrast for arbitrary…
Matter-wave interferometry is a highly sensitive tool to measure small perturbations in a quantum system. This property allows the creation of precision sensors for dephasing mechanisms such as mechanical vibrations. They are a challenge…
We review different attempts to show the decoherence process in double-slit-like experiments both for charged particles (electrons) and neutral particles with permanent dipole moments. Interference is studied when electrons or atomic…
Interference with atomic and molecular matter waves is a rich branch of atomic physics and quantum optics. It started with atom diffraction from crystal surfaces and the separated oscillatory fields technique used in atomic clocks. Atom…
In this brief paper, we show that atom interferometer experiments such as MAGIS, AION or AEDGE have the potential to not only probe very light dark matter models, but they will also probe quantum gravity. We show that the linear coupling of…
Direct detection experiments for dark matter are increasingly ruling out large parameter spaces. However, light dark matter models with particle masses $<$ GeV are still largely unconstrained. Here we examine a proposal to use atom…
A new frontier in the search for dark matter (DM) is based on the idea of detecting the decoherence caused by DM scattering against a mesoscopic superposition of normal matter. Such superpositions are uniquely sensitive to very small…