Hannover 2013 – wissenschaftliches Programm
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SYQG: Symposium Quantum meets gravity and metrology
SYQG 2: Quantum meets gravity and metrology II
SYQG 2.4: Vortrag
Dienstag, 19. März 2013, 15:30–15:45, E 415
A satellite based quantum test of Einstein’s equivalence principle — •Christian Schubert1 and the STE-QUEST ATI team2 — 1Institut für Quantenoptik, LU Hannover — 2European Consortium
STE-QUEST [1] aims for performing a quantum test of Einstein’s Equivalence principle by verifying the universality of the free propagation of matter waves on a satellite. A dual species atom interferometer will measure the differential acceleration of Bose-Einstein condensates of 87Rb and 85Rb. This is assumed to be zero if the inertial mass coincides with the gravitational mass. The Eötvös ratio derived from the differential signal will be determined with an accuracy of parts in 1015 beyond state-of-the-art precision of 10−13 established by lunar laser ranging and torsion balances.
The matter waves will be simultaneously prepared and interrogated with a free evolution time of 10 s enabled by the weightlessness conditions in space. Within a single cycle of 20 s a shot noise limited sensitivity to accelerations of 3· 10−12 m/s2 is anticipated. The simultaneous interferometry is carried out in a double diffraction Mach-Zehnder geometry and allows for high suppression ratios of noise and bias terms.
In the talk the measurement principle will presented, an overview of the preliminary payload design will be given, and the estimated error budget will be discussed.
STE-QUEST is a proposal for an M3 mission in the frame of the Cosmic Vision program of ESA.
[1] http://sci.esa.int/ste-quest