Gravity-Superconductors interactions: Theory and experiment

Abstract

Recent developments in this new subject are summarized by many of the researchers most directly involved. If gravitation has to be eventually reconciled with quantum mechanics, the macroscopic quantum character of superconductors might actually matter. Is it possible to generate gravity-like fields by condensed-matter systems, in conditions accessible in a laboratory? General Relativity and lowest-order Quantum Gravity predict in this case very small emission rates, so these phenomena can only become relevant if some strong quantum effect occurs. The novel experimental evidence of anomalous interactions between gravity and superconductors requires on one hand a pragmatic approach, for the verification of the effects and their detailed characterization in a model-independent way. On the other hand, this evidence is a challenge to our ability to develop creative ideas, new physical and formal concepts for their explanation, in an unknown territory placed between general relativity, quantum mechanics and new physics. A high level of multi-disciplinarity is needed, because the research spans here from superconductors (London equation, Ginzburg-Landau theory...) to gravitation (spacetime geometry, metrices, etc.) to quantum field theory and its formalism, to the techniques connected to field generation and detection. © 2013 Bentham Science Publishers. All Rights Reserved.