Does the Vacuum Gravitate on Microscopic Scales? Rydberg Atoms Indicate Probably Not

Abstract

The cosmological constant presents one of the most fascinating and confounding problems in physics. A straightforward, seemingly robust prediction of quantum mechanics and general relativity is that the vacuum energy gravitates. Therefore, the cosmological constant should be enormous. It is minuscule. Since there is no understanding of why the cosmological constant is so small, it is important to test this idea in many different situations. In particular, given the span of distances in astronomy and particle physics, it is vital to test the gravitation of vacuum energy on as many distance scales as we can. Rydberg atoms open up a new set of distances for exploration. It is satisfying to measure the cosmological constant with an atom, but its main significance is extending measurements to microscopic distances. Here, too, there is no evidence of the gravitation of the vacuum. At scales of a micron and less, we place a limit of $7$ GeV on the scale of gravitating vacuum energy, well below the scale of $100$ GeV of the SM of particle physics.

Accepted in PRD

References in corpus (12)

• Dynamics of dark energy
• Degravitation of the Cosmological Constant and Graviton Width
• IR/UV Mixing, Towers of Species and Swampland Conjectures
• Equation of state of the running vacuum
• Precision measurement of the ionization energy and quantum defects of 39K I
• The cosmological constant and the use of cutoffs
• Artificial Dynamical Effects in Quantum Field Theory
• Effective field equations and scale-dependent couplings in gravity
• Testing a varying-$\Lambda$ model for dark energy within Co-varying Physical Couplings framework
• Is "Dark Energy" a Quantum Vacuum Energy?
• Cosmological Constant in Coherent Quantum Gravity
• A thermodynamic origin for the Cohen-Kaplan-Nelson bound

Cited by in corpus (1)

• Is Dark Energy Dynamical in the DESI Era? A Critical Review