Results on the gravity of quantum Fermi pressure of localized matter: A new test of general relativity
- Gravitation Group, Tata Institute of Fundamental Research, Homi Bhabha Road, Mumbai - 400 005 (India)
- School of Engineering and Applied Science, University of Virginia, Charlottesville, Virginia 22904-4746 (United States)
Recently Ehlers, Ozsvath, and Schucking discussed whether pressure contributes to active gravitational mass as required by general relativity. They pointed out that there is no experimental information on this available, though precision measurement of the gravitational constant should provide a test of this foundational aspect of gravity. We had used a similar argument earlier to test the contribution of leptons to the active gravitational mass. In this paper we use the result from the Zuerich gravitational constant experiment to provide the first adequate experimental input regarding the active gravitational mass of Fermi pressure. Apart from confirming the equality of the passive and active gravitational roles of the pressure term in general relativity within an accuracy of 5%, our results are consistent with the theoretical expectation of the cancellation of the gravity of pressure by the gravity of the surface tension of confined matter. This result on the active gravitational mass of the quantum zero-point Fermi pressure in the atomic nucleus is also interesting from the point of view of studying the interplay between quantum physics and classical gravity.
- OSTI ID:
- 20774655
- Journal Information:
- Physical Review. D, Particles Fields, Vol. 73, Issue 10; Other Information: DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevD.73.101101; (c) 2006 The American Physical Society; Country of input: International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA); ISSN 0556-2821
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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