GRAVITO-ELECTROMAGNETISM: GLIMPSES OF UNEXPLORED DEEP CONNECTIONS

Abstract

Any attempt at unification of the fundamental interactions will recognize its 'right path' when electromagnetism and gravity are seen together as manifestations of the same interaction. First excitement along this direction was the Kaluza–Klein program, and the unsuccessful attempt was Einstein's unified field theory. Over the years, the program has changed much, but the basic idea that there are links between gravity and electromagnetism, perhaps in a higher dimensional world, has not changed. There are several interesting and important phenomenological aspects related to this issue, to be experimentally explored at the classical level, which may reveal some of the deep connections between the two long range interactions. In this essay, we discuss a program to experimentally explore some connections between gravity and electromagnetism, not yet adequately studied. Some of the key issues we address are the complete absence of gravity for electrons inside a metal drift tube (Schiff–Barnhill effect) and its rotational variant, the Schuster–Blackett relation between rotation of neutral matter and generation of magnetic fields, and a variation of the Faraday unipolar induction. These experiments that probe macroscopic, low energy, and seemingly classical aspects, have the potential to reveal underlying microscopic, high energy, unification scale quantum connections between gravity and electromagnetism.