Abstract
We studied the neutron quantum states in the potential well formed by the Earth's gravitational field and a horizontal mirror. The estimated characteristic sizes of the neutron wave functions in two lowest quantum states correspond to their expectations with an accuracy of ≈25 %. The spatial density distribution in a standing neutron wave above a mirror was measured for a set of a few lowest quantum states. A position-sensitive neutron detector with an extra high spatial resolution of 1 μm to 2 μm was developed and tested for this particular task. Although this experiment was not designed or optimized to search for an additional short-range force, nevertheless it allowed us to slightly improve the published boundary in the nanometer range of characteristic distances. We studied systematical uncertainties in the chosen "flow-through" method as well as the feasibility to improve further the accuracy in this experiment.
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Schedule a callMore From: Journal of research of the National Institute of Standards and Technology
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