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arXiv · quant-ph/9712017

A Scheme to Probe the Decoherence of a Macroscopic Object

S. Bose·K. Jacobs·P. L. Knight
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Abstract

We propose a quantum optical version of Schr\"{o}dinger's famous gedanken experiment in which the state of a microscopic system (a cavity field) becomes entangled with and disentangled from the state of a massive object (a movable mirror). Despite the fact that a mixture of Schr\"{o}dinger cat states is produced during the evolution (due to the fact that the macroscopic mirror starts off in a thermal state), this setup allows us to systematically probe the rules by which a superposition of spatially separated states of a macroscopic object decoheres. The parameter regime required to test environment-induced decoherence models is found to be close to those currently realizable, while that required to detect gravitationally induced collapse is well beyond current technology.

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S. Bose, K. Jacobs, P. L. Knight. 1997-12-08. A Scheme to Probe the Decoherence of a Macroscopic Object. https://doi.org/10.1103/physreva.59.3204

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