Breakdown of the equivalence between gravitational mass and energy for a composite quantum body

Abstract

The simplest quantum composite body, a hydrogen atom, is considered in the presence of a weak external gravitational field. We define an operator for the passive gravitational mass of the atom in the post-Newtonian approximation of the general relativity and show that it does not commute with its energy operator. Nevertheless, the equivalence between the expectation values of the mass and energy is shown to survive at a macroscopic level for stationary quantum states. Breakdown of the equivalence between passive gravitational mass and energy at a microscopic level for stationary quantum states can be experimentally detected by studying unusual electromagnetic radiation, emitted by the atoms, supported by and moving in the Earth's gravitational field with constant velocity, using spacecraft or satellite

4 pages, no figures. arXiv admin note: substantial text overlap with arXiv:1404.3765

References in corpus (1)

• Breakdown of the Equivalence between Energy Content and Weight in a Weak Gravitational Field for a Quantum Body

Cited by in corpus (4)

• Breakdown of the equivalence between active gravitational mass and energy for a quantum body
• Breakdown of the Equivalence between Gravitational Mass and Energy for a Quantum Body: Theory and Suggested Experiments
• Inequivalence between gravitational mass and energy due to quantum effects at microscopic and macroscopic levels
• Inequivalence Between Passive Gravitational Mass and Energy for a Quantum Body: Theory and Suggested Experiment