Article ID | Journal | Published Year | Pages | File Type |
---|---|---|---|---|
5495457 | Physics Letters B | 2017 | 4 Pages |
Abstract
The interaction due to quantum gravitational vacuum fluctuations between a gravitationally polarizable object modelled as a two-level system and a gravitational boundary is investigated. This quantum gravitational interaction is found to be position-dependent, which induces a force in close analogy to the Casimir-Polder force in the electromagnetic case. For a Dirichlet boundary, the quantum gravitational potential for the polarizable object in its ground-state is shown to behave like zâ5 in the near zone, and zâ6 in the far zone, where z is the distance to the boundary. For a concrete example, where a Bose-Einstein condensate is taken as a gravitationally polarizable object, the relative correction to the radius of the BEC caused by fluctuating quantum gravitational waves in vacuum is found to be of order 10â21. Although the correction is far too small to observe in comparison with its electromagnetic counterpart, it is nevertheless of the order of the gravitational strain caused by a recently detected black hole merger on the arms of the LIGO.
Related Topics
Physical Sciences and Engineering
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Authors
Jiawei Hu, Hongwei Yu,