Gravitational decoherence of photons

Abstract

Models of gravitational decoherence are not commonly applied to ultra-relativistic systems, including photons. As a result, few quantum optical tests of gravitational decoherence have been developed. In this paper, we generalize the gravitational decoherence model of Anastopoulos and Hu (2013 Class. Quantum Grav. 30 165007) to photons. In this model, decoherence originates from a bath of stochastic gravitational perturbations, possibly of fundamental origin. We derive a master equation for general states of the electromagnetic field; the only free parameter is a noise temperature Θ of the gravitational fluctuations. We find that interference experiments with long baselines, accessible in near-future experiments, can, in principle, lead to strong constraints in Θ.