Kavli Affiliate: Nergis Mavalvala
| Summary:
Quantum mechanics and general relativity are the foundational pillars of modern physics, yet experimental tests that combine the two frameworks remain rare. Measuring optical phase shifts of massless photons in a gravitational potential provides a unique quantum platform to probe gravity beyond Newtonian descriptions, but laboratory-based interferometers have not yet reached the sensitivity needed to access this regime. Here, we report the realization of a 50-km table-top Mach-Zehnder fiber interferometer operating at the single-photon level, achieving a phase sensitivity of $4.42times10^-6$ rad root-mean-square (RMS) within the frequency range of 0.01 Hz to 5 Hz. We demonstrate that this sensitivity is sufficient to resolve a phase-shift signal of $(6.18 pm 0.44)times10^-5$ rad RMS at 0.1 Hz, associated with a modulated gravity-induced signal. Our results establish a milestone for quantum sensing with large-scale optical interferometry, demonstrating the capability to detect gravitational redshifts in a local laboratory, thereby paving the way for testing quantum phenomena within general relativistic frameworks.
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