Understanding dark energy

About

Cosmologists have observed that the expansion of the universe is accelerating, and some have suggested that that this may be due to a new scalar field, whose particles are very light. The energy density of this field drives the universal acceleration, but it is also expected to produce a small force between atoms and a test mass in vacuum.

We use atom interferometry, in which the motion of a cloud of falling atoms is placed into a state of quantum superposition, to sense the very small force that is predicted by these theories. This is a joint project with Prof. Edmund Copeland at the University of Nottingham.

Find out more

You can find out more on our project page Dark energy

Contact

For more information, please contact Prof. Ben Sauer (ben.sauer@imperial.ac.uk)