Spacetime effects on wavepackets of coherent light

TL;DR

This paper explores how gravity affects quantum-coherent light wavepackets in curved spacetime, revealing that quantum coherence can amplify gravitationally induced deformations, with implications for quantum communication and gravity probing.

Contribution

It introduces an operational method to distinguish wavepacket shifts from deformations and demonstrates how quantum coherence enhances gravitational effects on light in curved spacetime.

Findings

Quantum coherence increases wavepacket deformation in curved spacetime.

The method distinguishes between overall shifts and genuine deformations.

Results are applicable to Earth-satellite quantum communication experiments.

Abstract

We investigate the interplay between gravity and the quantum coherence present in the state of a pulse of light propagating in curved spacetime. We first introduce an operational way to distinguish between the overall shift in the pulse wavepacket and its genuine deformation after propagation. We then apply our technique to quantum states of photons that are coherent in the frequency degree of freedom, as well as to states of completely incoherent light. We focus on Gaussian profiles and frequency combs and find that the quantum coherence initially present can enhance the deformation induced by propagation in a curved background. These results further supports the claim that genuine quantum features, such as quantum coherence, can be used to probe the gravitational properties of physical systems. We specialize our techniques to Earth-to-satellite communication setups, where the effects of gravity are weak but can be tested with current satellite technologies.