Measuring gravitational attraction with a lattice atom interferometer

Year: 2024

Authors: Panda CD., Tao MJ., Ceja M., Khoury J., Tino GM., Muller H.

Autors Affiliation: Univ Calif Berkeley, Dept Phys, Berkeley, CA 94720 USA; Univ Penn, Dept Phys & Astron, Philadelphia, PA USA; Univ Firenze, Dipartimento Fis & Astron, INFN, CNR,INO, Sesto Fiorentino, Italy; European Lab Nonlinear Spect LENS, Sesto Fiorentino, Italy.

Abstract: Despite being the dominant force of nature on large scales, gravity remains relatively elusive to precision laboratory experiments. Atom interferometers are powerful tools for investigating, for example, Earth’s gravity1, the gravitational constant2, deviations from Newtonian gravity3-6 and general relativity7. However, using atoms in free fall limits measurement time to a few seconds8, and much less when measuring interactions with a small source mass2,5,6,9. Recently, interferometers with atoms suspended for 70 s in an optical-lattice mode filtered by an optical cavity have been demonstrated10-14. However, the optical lattice must balance Earth’s gravity by applying forces that are a billionfold stronger than the putative signals, so even tiny imperfections may generate complex systematic effects. Thus, lattice interferometers have yet to be used for precision tests of gravity. Here we optimize the gravitational sensitivity of a lattice interferometer and use a system of signal inversions to suppress and quantify systematic effects. We measure the attraction of a miniature source mass to be amass = 33.3 +/- 5.6stat +/- 2.7syst nm s-2, consistent with Newtonian gravity, ruling out ’screened fifth force’ theories3,15,16 over their natural parameter space. The overall accuracy of 6.2 nm s-2 surpasses by more than a factor of four the best similar measurements with atoms in free fall5,6. Improved atom cooling and tilt-noise suppression may further increase sensitivity for investigating forces at sub-millimetre ranges17,18, compact gravimetry19-22, measuring the gravitational Aharonov-Bohm effect9,23 and the gravitational constant2, and testing whether the gravitational field has quantum properties24. Using an optical lattice to suspend atoms, the gravitational attraction of a miniature source mass can be determined by an atom interferometer with much greater accuracy compared with atoms in free fall.

Journal/Review: NATURE

Volume: 631 (8021)      Pages from:   to:

More Information: We thank A. Reynoso and J. Egelhoff for experimental assistance; J. Lopez, T. Gutierrez and G. Long for technical support; G. Louie and P. Bhattacharyya for discussions and comments on the manuscript; J. Axelrod, B. Elder, M. Jaffe, P. Haslinger, Y. Murakami, A. Singh and V. Xu and the entire Muller group for valuable discussions. This material is based on work supported by: National Science Foundation grants 1708160 and 2208029 (H.M.); Department of Defense Office of Naval Research grant N00014-20-1-2656 (H.M.); and Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) grants 1659506 and 16 69913 (H.M.).DAS:All data presented in this paper are deposited online63.
KeyWords: Gravity; Acceleration
DOI: 10.1038/s41586-024-07561-3

Citations: 3
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