Atom interferometry and the Einstein equivalence principle

Abstract

The computation of the phase shift in a symmetric atom interferometer in the presence of a gravitational field is reviewed. The difference of action-phase integrals between the two paths of the interferometer is zero for any Lagrangian which is at most quadratic in position and velocity. We emphasize that in a large class of theories of gravity the atom interferometer permits a test of the weak version of the equivalence principle (or universality of free fall) by comparing the acceleration of atoms with that of ordinary bodies, but is insensitive to that aspect of the equivalence principle known as the gravitational redshift or universality of clock rates.Comment: 5 pages, to appear in the proceedings of the "46th Rencontres de Moriond and GPhyS Colloquium on Gravitational Waves and Experimental Gravity", la Thuile, March 20-27, 201