Prospects for Studies of the Free Fall and Gravitational Quantum States of Antimatter
Different experiments are ongoing to measure the effect of gravity on cold neutral antimatter atoms such as positronium, muonium, and antihydrogen. Among those, the project GBAR at CERN aims to measure precisely the gravitational fall of ultracold antihydrogen atoms. In the ultracold regime, the int...
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
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Wiley
2015-01-01
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| Series: | Advances in High Energy Physics |
| Online Access: | http://dx.doi.org/10.1155/2015/379642 |
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| author | G. Dufour D. B. Cassidy P. Crivelli P. Debu A. Lambrecht V. V. Nesvizhevsky S. Reynaud A. Yu. Voronin T. E. Wall |
| author_facet | G. Dufour D. B. Cassidy P. Crivelli P. Debu A. Lambrecht V. V. Nesvizhevsky S. Reynaud A. Yu. Voronin T. E. Wall |
| author_sort | G. Dufour |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | Different experiments are ongoing to measure the effect of gravity on cold neutral antimatter atoms such as positronium, muonium, and antihydrogen. Among those, the project GBAR at CERN aims to measure precisely the gravitational fall of ultracold antihydrogen atoms. In the ultracold regime, the interaction of antihydrogen atoms with a surface is governed by the phenomenon of quantum reflection which results in bouncing of antihydrogen atoms on matter surfaces. This allows the application of a filtering scheme to increase the precision of the free fall measurement. In the ultimate limit of smallest vertical velocities, antihydrogen atoms are settled in gravitational quantum states in close analogy to ultracold neutrons (UCNs). Positronium is another neutral system involving antimatter for which free fall under gravity is currently being investigated at UCL. Building on the experimental techniques under development for the free fall measurement, gravitational quantum states could also be observed in positronium. In this contribution, we report on the status of the ongoing experiments and discuss the prospects of observing gravitational quantum states of antimatter and their implications. |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj-art-43028a584d9742b2810c254fb275f552 |
| institution | Kabale University |
| issn | 1687-7357 1687-7365 |
| language | English |
| publishDate | 2015-01-01 |
| publisher | Wiley |
| record_format | Article |
| series | Advances in High Energy Physics |
| spelling | doaj-art-43028a584d9742b2810c254fb275f5522025-02-03T01:26:13ZengWileyAdvances in High Energy Physics1687-73571687-73652015-01-01201510.1155/2015/379642379642Prospects for Studies of the Free Fall and Gravitational Quantum States of AntimatterG. Dufour0D. B. Cassidy1P. Crivelli2P. Debu3A. Lambrecht4V. V. Nesvizhevsky5S. Reynaud6A. Yu. Voronin7T. E. Wall8Laboratoire Kastler-Brossel, CNRS, ENS, Collège de France, UPMC, Campus Jussieu, 75252 Paris, FranceDepartment of Physics and Astronomy, University College London, Gower Street, London WC1E 6BT, UKETH Zurich, 8093 Zurich, SwitzerlandInstitut de Recherche sur les lois Fondamentales de l’Univers, CEA Saclay, 91191 Gif-sur-Yvette, FranceLaboratoire Kastler-Brossel, CNRS, ENS, Collège de France, UPMC, Campus Jussieu, 75252 Paris, FranceInstitut Max von Laue-Paul Langevin, 6 rue Jules Horowitz, 38042 Grenoble, FranceLaboratoire Kastler-Brossel, CNRS, ENS, Collège de France, UPMC, Campus Jussieu, 75252 Paris, FranceP.N. Lebedev Physical Institute, 53 Leninsky Prospekt, 117924 Moscow, RussiaDepartment of Physics and Astronomy, University College London, Gower Street, London WC1E 6BT, UKDifferent experiments are ongoing to measure the effect of gravity on cold neutral antimatter atoms such as positronium, muonium, and antihydrogen. Among those, the project GBAR at CERN aims to measure precisely the gravitational fall of ultracold antihydrogen atoms. In the ultracold regime, the interaction of antihydrogen atoms with a surface is governed by the phenomenon of quantum reflection which results in bouncing of antihydrogen atoms on matter surfaces. This allows the application of a filtering scheme to increase the precision of the free fall measurement. In the ultimate limit of smallest vertical velocities, antihydrogen atoms are settled in gravitational quantum states in close analogy to ultracold neutrons (UCNs). Positronium is another neutral system involving antimatter for which free fall under gravity is currently being investigated at UCL. Building on the experimental techniques under development for the free fall measurement, gravitational quantum states could also be observed in positronium. In this contribution, we report on the status of the ongoing experiments and discuss the prospects of observing gravitational quantum states of antimatter and their implications.http://dx.doi.org/10.1155/2015/379642 |
| spellingShingle | G. Dufour D. B. Cassidy P. Crivelli P. Debu A. Lambrecht V. V. Nesvizhevsky S. Reynaud A. Yu. Voronin T. E. Wall Prospects for Studies of the Free Fall and Gravitational Quantum States of Antimatter Advances in High Energy Physics |
| title | Prospects for Studies of the Free Fall and Gravitational Quantum States of Antimatter |
| title_full | Prospects for Studies of the Free Fall and Gravitational Quantum States of Antimatter |
| title_fullStr | Prospects for Studies of the Free Fall and Gravitational Quantum States of Antimatter |
| title_full_unstemmed | Prospects for Studies of the Free Fall and Gravitational Quantum States of Antimatter |
| title_short | Prospects for Studies of the Free Fall and Gravitational Quantum States of Antimatter |
| title_sort | prospects for studies of the free fall and gravitational quantum states of antimatter |
| url | http://dx.doi.org/10.1155/2015/379642 |
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