Tobar Germain, Manikandan Sreenath K, Beitel Thomas, Pikovski Igor
Department of Physics, Stockholm University, SE-106 91, Stockholm, Sweden.
Okinawa Institute of Science and Technology, 1919-1 Tancha, Onna-son, Kunigami-gun, Okinawa, 904-0495, Japan.
Nat Commun. 2024 Aug 22;15(1):7229. doi: 10.1038/s41467-024-51420-8.
The quantization of gravity is widely believed to result in gravitons - particles of discrete energy that form gravitational waves. But their detection has so far been considered impossible. Here we show that signatures of single graviton exchange can be observed in laboratory experiments. We show that stimulated and spontaneous single-graviton processes can become relevant for massive quantum acoustic resonators and that stimulated absorption can be resolved through continuous sensing of quantum jumps. We analyze the feasibility of observing the exchange of single energy quanta between matter and gravitational waves. Our results show that single graviton signatures are within reach of experiments. In analogy to the discovery of the photo-electric effect for photons, such signatures can provide the first experimental clue of the quantization of gravity.
人们普遍认为，引力的量子化会产生引力子——构成引力波的离散能量粒子。但迄今为止，它们的探测被认为是不可能的。在此，我们表明，单引力子交换的特征可以在实验室实验中被观测到。我们表明，受激和自发的单引力子过程对于大质量量子声学谐振器可能变得重要，并且受激吸收可以通过对量子跃迁的连续传感来分辨。我们分析了观测物质与引力波之间单能量量子交换的可行性。我们的结果表明，单引力子特征在实验可及范围内。类似于光子光电效应的发现，这样的特征可以为引力的量子化提供首个实验线索。
