Testing General
Relativity in Fermilab
University
of Missouri-Columbia
Modern theories of the
fundamental particles and the interactions among them have achieved a simple
and coherent description of an unprecedented range of natural phenomena, but
our new understanding raises intriguing new questions. Though there is a
growing confidence in our ability to unify electroweak and strong interactions
in a single gauge theory, gravity remains widely separated from the particle
physics. In fact, road to a correct description of quantum gravity depends
crucially on if experimental search methods end up with a negative or positive
answer for the presence of higher-curvature space-time dimensions. Our
theoretical study of general-relativistic gravitational force generated by a 1
Tev bunch of protons at Fermilab Tevatron accelerator demonstrates that the
force has many similarities with the synchrotron radiation, and is in the range
of sensitivity of modern low-frequency (torsion balance-type) detectors. Its
measurement may open new fascinating opportunities for experimental study of
the unification of gravity with other fundamental interactions presumably
including the string theory.