Constraining symmetron fields with a levitated optomechanical system

TL;DR

This paper proposes using a levitated optomechanical system with a nanosphere to detect symmetron fields, potentially improving constraints on dark energy models by up to three orders of magnitude over existing methods.

Contribution

It introduces a novel experimental scheme employing a levitated nanosphere to set tighter constraints on symmetron fields, overcoming screening challenges in traditional measurements.

Findings

Refined constraints improve by 1 to 3 orders of magnitude.

The scheme detects symmetron-induced frequency shifts.

Potential for new dark energy detection methods.

Abstract

The symmetron, one of the light scalar fields introduced by dark energy theories, is thought to modify the gravitational force when it couples to matter. However, detecting the symmetron field is challenging due to its screening behavior in the high-density environment of traditional measurements. In this paper, we propose a scheme to set constraints on the parameters of the symmetron with a levitated optomechanical system, in which a nanosphere serves as a testing mass coupled to an optical cavity. By measuring the frequency shift of the probe transmission spectrum, we can establish constraints for our scheme by calculating the symmetron-induced influence. These refined constraints improve by 1 to 3 orders of magnitude compared to current force-based detection methods, which offer new opportunities for the dark energy detection.