J W Moffat and G T Gillies 2002 New J. Phys. 4 92 doi:10.1088/1367-2630/4/1/392
Satellite Eötvös test of the weak equivalence principle for zero-point vacuum energy
J W Moffat1,2 and G T Gillies3
Show affiliationsAn Eötvös experiment to test the weak equivalence principle (WEP) for zero-point vacuum energy is proposed using a satellite. Following the suggestion of Ross for a terrestrial experiment of this type, the acceleration of a spherical test mass of aluminium would be compared with that of a similar test mass made from another material. The estimated ratio of the zero-point vacuum energy density inside the aluminium sphere to the rest mass energy density is ~1.6×10-14, which would allow a 1% resolution of a potential WEP violation observed in a satellite mission test that had a baseline sensitivity to WEP violations of ~10-16. An observed violation of the WEP for vacuum energy density would constitute a significant clue as to the origin of the cosmological constant and the source of dark energy, and test a recently proposed resolution of the cosmological constant problem, based on a model of nonlocal quantum gravity and quantum field theory.
- PACS
- Subjects
- Dates
-
Issue 1 (November 2002)
Received 13 August 2002
Published 14 November 2002
-
Satellite Eötvös test of the weak equivalence principle for zero-point vacuum energy
J W Moffat and G T Gillies 2002 New J. Phys. 4 92
-
Behaviour of Au/Pd thermocouple in various gases
Yong-Gyoo Kim 1998 Meas. Sci. Technol. 9 1211
-
Comb-drive actuators for large displacements
Rob Legtenberg et al 1996 J. Micromech. Microeng. 6 320
-
Characterization of quantum-confined CdS nanocrystallites stabilized by deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA)
J L Coffer et al 1992 Nanotechnology 3 69
-
The phase of scalar field driven wormholes at one loop in the path integral formulation for Euclidean quantum gravity
A Carlini and M Martellini 1992 Class. Quantum Grav. 9 629
-
Micromachining compatible metal patterning technique using localized decomposition of an organometallic compound by laser irradiation
Eiji Makino and Takayuki Shibata 1998 J. Micromech. Microeng. 8 177
-
Glueing Reissner-Nordstrom spacetimes along charged shells of matter
T Dray and P S Joshi 1990 Class. Quantum Grav. 7 41
-
Increased phase-matching bandwidth in simple ultrashort-laser-pulse measurements
Patrick O'Shea et al 2002 J. Opt. B: Quantum Semiclass. Opt. 4 44
-
Influence of Pulse Steepness on Vacuum Flashover of Casting Epoxy Resin
Chen Yu et al 2009 Plasma Sci. Technol. 11 89
-
Nitrogen species from radio frequency plasma sources used for molecular beam epitaxy growth of GaN
A V Blant et al 2000 Plasma Sources Sci. Technol. 9 12
Related review articles
What's this?- Does the growth of structure affect our dynamical models of the Universe? The averaging, backreaction, and fitting problems in cosmology
- Scattering amplitudes: the most perfect microscopic structures in the universe
- Loop quantum cosmology: a status report