On-chip quantum interference of a superconducting microsphere

By H. Pino, J. Prat‐Camps, Kanu Sinha, B. Venkatesh, Oriol Romero-Isart. 2016

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We propose and analyze an all-magnetic scheme to perform a Young’s double slit experiment with a micron-sized superconducting sphere of mass ≳ 10 13 amu. We show that its center of mass could be prepared in a spatial quantum superposition state with an extent of the order of half a micrometer. The scheme is based on magnetically levitating the sphere above a superconducting chip and letting it skate through a static magnetic potential landscape where it interacts for short intervals with quantum circuits. In this way, a protocol for fast quantum interferometry using quantum magnetomechanics is passively implemented. Such a table-top earth-based quantum experiment would operate in a parameter regime where gravitational energy scales become relevant. In particular, we show that the faint parameter-free gravitationally-induced decoherence collapse model, proposed by Diósi and Penrose, could be unambiguously falsified.

Subfields: Atomic and Molecular Physics, and Optics

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/bd3ab04fd356e51f2a3255df00d1989c08628fd3