School of Astronomy (SoA) - Weekly Seminar 

On the tests of light speed isotropy

Qasem Exirifard (IPM)

Abstract:

We review the interferometry experiments aimed/tried to measure possible violation of isotropy in the light speed. Among these, Michelson-Morely experiments can measure deviation from an isotropic distribution that is invariant under the flip of the light direction (parity preserving deviation). Triangular interferometry (Trimmer method), on the other hand, can measure the deviation that is not invariant under parity. 

We discuss what design should we choose for the triangular interferometry in order to map a possibly observed phase difference to the break of parity in light speed. We show that using current technologies in earth-land experiment shall measure isotropy in light speed (or its break) by the precision of at least $10^{-6} m/s $. No experiment has measured parity violation in the distribution of light speed in space with this precision. We thus propose to perform (repeat) the (slightly modified) Trimmer experiment with the current technology.

Wednesday / 25-August-2010 / 3-Shahrivar-1389/ 2:00 PM

IPM Larak Building-School of Astronomy
Address: Larak Garden, opposite Araj, Artesh Highway,Tehran, Iran
E-mail: astro(at)ipm.ir