Lamine Brahim, Hervé Rémy, Lambrecht Astrid, Reynaud Serge
Laboratoire Kastler Brossel, Université Pierre et Marie Curie, case74, Campus Jussieu, F-75252 Paris cedex 05, France.
Phys Rev Lett. 2006 Feb 10;96(5):050405. doi: 10.1103/PhysRevLett.96.050405. Epub 2006 Feb 9.
Stochastic backgrounds of gravitational waves are intrinsic fluctuations of spacetime which lead to an unavoidable decoherence mechanism. This mechanism manifests itself as a degradation of the contrast of quantum interferences. It defines an ultimate decoherence border for matter-wave interferometry using larger and larger molecules. We give a quantitative characterization of this border in terms of figures involving the gravitational environment as well as the sensitivity of the interferometer to gravitational waves. The known level of gravitational noise determines the maximal size of the molecular probe for which interferences may remain observable. We discuss the relevance of this result in the context of ongoing progresses towards more and more sensitive matter-wave interferometry.
引力波的随机背景是时空的固有涨落，它导致一种不可避免的退相干机制。这种机制表现为量子干涉对比度的降低。它为使用越来越大的分子进行物质波干涉测量定义了一个最终的退相干边界。我们根据涉及引力环境以及干涉仪对引力波敏感度的数字，对这个边界进行了定量描述。已知的引力噪声水平决定了分子探针的最大尺寸，对于该尺寸，干涉可能仍然可以观测到。我们在朝着越来越灵敏的物质波干涉测量不断取得进展的背景下，讨论了这一结果的相关性。
