Experimental Observation of Earth's Rotation with Quantum Entanglement

Abstract

Precision interferometry with quantum states has emerged as an essential tool for experimentally answering fundamental questions in physics. Optical quantum interferometers are of particular interest due to mature methods for generating and manipulating quantum states of light. The increased sensitivity offered by these states promises to enable quantum phenomena, such as entanglement, to be tested in unprecedented regimes where tiny effects due to gravity come into play. However, this requires long and decoherence-free processing of quantum entanglement, which has not yet been explored for large interferometric areas. Here we present a table-top experiment using maximally path-entangled quantum states of light in an interferometer with an area of 715 m${}^2$, sensitive enough to measure the rotation rate of Earth. A rotatable setup and an active area switching technique allow us to control the coupling of Earth's rotation to an entangled pair of single photons. The achieved sensitivity of 5 $\mu$rad/s constitutes the highest rotation resolution ever achieved with optical quantum interferometers, surpassing previous work by three orders of magnitude. Our result demonstrates the feasibility of extending the utilization of maximally entangled quantum states to large-scale interferometers. Further improvements to our methodology will enable measurements of general-relativistic effects on entangled photons opening the way to further enhance the precision of fundamental measurements to explore the interplay between quantum mechanics and general relativity along with searches for new physics.

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