Casimir, Gravitational and Neutron Tests of Dark Energy

TL;DR

This paper explores laboratory tests of dark energy theories that modify gravity, focusing on scalar interactions in experiments like Casimir, Eot-wash, and neutron tests, and assesses their detectability with upcoming experiments.

Contribution

It provides a unified tomographic framework to test various dark energy models, including f(R), dilaton, and symmetron, in laboratory experiments.

Findings

Dilaton, symmetron, and chameleon models are testable in laboratory settings.

Upcoming Casimir experiments like CANNEX could detect generalized chameleon models.

Laboratory tests can effectively constrain or detect scalar interactions from dark energy theories.

Abstract

We investigate laboratory tests of dark energy theories which modify gravity in a way generalising the inverse power law chameleon models. We make use of the tomographic description of such theories which captures $f(R)$ models in the large curvature limit, the dilaton and the symmetron. We consider their effects in various experiments where the presence of a new scalar interaction may be uncovered. More precisely, we focus on the Casimir, Eot-wash and neutron experiments. We show that dilatons, symmetrons and generalised chameleon models are efficiently testable in the laboratory. For generalised chameleons, we revise their status in the light of forthcoming Casimir experiments like CANNEX in Amsterdam and show that they are within reach of detection.