The small satellite “Galileo Galilei ” (GG) has been designed to test the equivalence principle (... more The small satellite “Galileo Galilei ” (GG) has been designed to test the equivalence principle (EP) to 10−17 with a total mass at launch of 250 kg. The key instrument is a differential accelerometer made up of weakly coupled coaxial, concentric test cylinders rapidly spinning around the symmetry axis and sensitive in the plane perpendicular to it, lying at a small inclination from the orbit plane. The whole spacecraft spins around the same symmetry axis so as to be passively stabilized. The test masses are large (10 kg each, to reduce thermal noise), their coupling is very weak (for high sensitivity to differ-ential effects), and rotation is fast (for high frequency modulation of the signal). A 1 g version of the accelerometer (“Galileo Galilei on the Ground ” — GGG) has been built to the full scale — except for coupling, which cannot be as weak as in the absence of weight, and a motor to maintain rotation (not needed in space due to angular momentum con-servation). GGG has proved:...
`Galileo Galilei' (GG) is a proposal for a small, low-orbit satellite devoted to testing the... more `Galileo Galilei' (GG) is a proposal for a small, low-orbit satellite devoted to testing the equivalence principle (EP) of Galileo, Newton and Einstein. The GG report on the phase A study recently carried out with funding from ASI (Agenzia Spaziale Italiana) concluded that GG can test the equivalence principle to 1 part in 1017 at room temperature. The main novelty is to modulate the expected differential signal of an EP violation at the spin rate of the spacecraft (2 Hz). Compared with other experiments, the modulation frequency is increased by more than a factor of 104, thus reducing 1/f (low-frequency) electronic and mechanical noise. The challenge for an EP test in space is to improve over the sensitivity of ground-based experiments (about 1 part in 1012) by many orders of magnitude, so as to deeply probe a so far totally unexplored field; doing that with more than one pair of bodies is an unnecessary complication. For this reason GG is now proposed with a single pair of test masses. At present the best and most reliable laboratory-controlled tests of the equivalence principle have been achieved by the `Eöt-Wash' group with small test cylinders arranged on a torsion balance placed on a turntable which provides the modulation of the signal (a 1-2 h rotation period). The torsion balance is not a suitable instrument in space. We have designed and built the GGG (`GG on the Ground') prototype. It is made of coaxial test cylinders weakly coupled (via mechanical suspensions) and quickly rotating (6 Hz achieved so far); in addition, it is well suited to be flown in space - where the driving signal is about three orders of magnitude stronger and the absence of weight is very helpful - inside the coaxial, co-rotating GG cylindrical spacecraft. The GGG apparatus is now operational. Preliminary measurement data indicate that weakly coupled, fast-spinning macroscopic rotors can be a suitable instrument to detect small differential effects. Rotation (up to 6 Hz so far) is stabilized by a small passive oil damper. A finer active damper, using small capacitance sensors and actuators as in the design of the space experiment, is in preparation. The current sensitivity of the GGG system is of 10-9 m s-2/&surd;Hz at about 300 s, which can be improved because horizontal seismic noise is rejected very well; perturbing effects of terrain tilts (due to microseismicity and tides) will be reduced by adding a passive cardanic suspension. As for the capacitance read-out, the current sensitivity (5 pm displacements in 1 s integration time at room temperature) is adequate to make GGG competitive with the torsion balance. Because of the stronger signal and weaker coupling of the test rotors in space, this sensitivity is also adequate for GG to reach its target accuracy (10-17). Information, references, research papers and photographs of the apparatus are available on the Web (http://tycho.dm.unipi.it/nobili).
Laboratory tests of the equivalence principle (EP) allow the experimental results to be checked b... more Laboratory tests of the equivalence principle (EP) allow the experimental results to be checked beyond question. The best such results have been obtained in a remarkable series of experiments using slowly rotating torsion balances1 that have found no violation to 10− ...
The small satellite "Galileo Galilei" (GG) has been designed to test the equivalence pr... more The small satellite "Galileo Galilei" (GG) has been designed to test the equivalence principle (EP) to 10-17 with a total mass at launch of 250 kg. The key instrument is a differential accelerometer made up of weakly coupled coaxial, concentric test cylinders rapidly spinning around the symmetry axis and sensitive in the plane perpendicular to it, lying at a small inclination from the orbit plane. The whole spacecraft spins around the same symmetry axis so as to be passively stabilized. The test masses are large (10 kg each, to reduce thermal noise), their coupling is very weak (for high sensitivity to differential effects), and rotation is fast (for high frequency modulation of the signal). A 1 g version of the accelerometer ("Galileo Galilei on the Ground" --- GGG) has been built to the full scale --- except for coupling, which cannot be as weak as in the absence of weight, and a motor to maintain rotation (not needed in space due to angular momentum conservation). GGG has proved: (i) high Q; (ii) auto-centering and long term stability; (iii) a sensitivity to EP testing which is close to the target sensitivity of the GG experiment provided that the physical properties of the experiment in space are going to be fully exploited.
The GG ("Galileo Galilei") satellite experiment aims to test the Equivalence Principle ... more The GG ("Galileo Galilei") satellite experiment aims to test the Equivalence Principle (EP) to 10-17 , an extremely ambitious goal (due to improve current best results by 4 orders of magnitude) that should tell us in a clear cut way whether we are in the presence of a new long-range physical interaction (violation) or not (confirmation). Either way, it would
The small satellite “Galileo Galilei ” (GG) has been designed to test the equivalence principle (... more The small satellite “Galileo Galilei ” (GG) has been designed to test the equivalence principle (EP) to 10−17 with a total mass at launch of 250 kg. The key instrument is a differential accelerometer made up of weakly coupled coaxial, concentric test cylinders rapidly spinning around the symmetry axis and sensitive in the plane perpendicular to it, lying at a small inclination from the orbit plane. The whole spacecraft spins around the same symmetry axis so as to be passively stabilized. The test masses are large (10 kg each, to reduce thermal noise), their coupling is very weak (for high sensitivity to differ-ential effects), and rotation is fast (for high frequency modulation of the signal). A 1 g version of the accelerometer (“Galileo Galilei on the Ground ” — GGG) has been built to the full scale — except for coupling, which cannot be as weak as in the absence of weight, and a motor to maintain rotation (not needed in space due to angular momentum con-servation). GGG has proved:...
`Galileo Galilei' (GG) is a proposal for a small, low-orbit satellite devoted to testing the... more `Galileo Galilei' (GG) is a proposal for a small, low-orbit satellite devoted to testing the equivalence principle (EP) of Galileo, Newton and Einstein. The GG report on the phase A study recently carried out with funding from ASI (Agenzia Spaziale Italiana) concluded that GG can test the equivalence principle to 1 part in 1017 at room temperature. The main novelty is to modulate the expected differential signal of an EP violation at the spin rate of the spacecraft (2 Hz). Compared with other experiments, the modulation frequency is increased by more than a factor of 104, thus reducing 1/f (low-frequency) electronic and mechanical noise. The challenge for an EP test in space is to improve over the sensitivity of ground-based experiments (about 1 part in 1012) by many orders of magnitude, so as to deeply probe a so far totally unexplored field; doing that with more than one pair of bodies is an unnecessary complication. For this reason GG is now proposed with a single pair of test masses. At present the best and most reliable laboratory-controlled tests of the equivalence principle have been achieved by the `Eöt-Wash' group with small test cylinders arranged on a torsion balance placed on a turntable which provides the modulation of the signal (a 1-2 h rotation period). The torsion balance is not a suitable instrument in space. We have designed and built the GGG (`GG on the Ground') prototype. It is made of coaxial test cylinders weakly coupled (via mechanical suspensions) and quickly rotating (6 Hz achieved so far); in addition, it is well suited to be flown in space - where the driving signal is about three orders of magnitude stronger and the absence of weight is very helpful - inside the coaxial, co-rotating GG cylindrical spacecraft. The GGG apparatus is now operational. Preliminary measurement data indicate that weakly coupled, fast-spinning macroscopic rotors can be a suitable instrument to detect small differential effects. Rotation (up to 6 Hz so far) is stabilized by a small passive oil damper. A finer active damper, using small capacitance sensors and actuators as in the design of the space experiment, is in preparation. The current sensitivity of the GGG system is of 10-9 m s-2/&surd;Hz at about 300 s, which can be improved because horizontal seismic noise is rejected very well; perturbing effects of terrain tilts (due to microseismicity and tides) will be reduced by adding a passive cardanic suspension. As for the capacitance read-out, the current sensitivity (5 pm displacements in 1 s integration time at room temperature) is adequate to make GGG competitive with the torsion balance. Because of the stronger signal and weaker coupling of the test rotors in space, this sensitivity is also adequate for GG to reach its target accuracy (10-17). Information, references, research papers and photographs of the apparatus are available on the Web (http://tycho.dm.unipi.it/nobili).
Laboratory tests of the equivalence principle (EP) allow the experimental results to be checked b... more Laboratory tests of the equivalence principle (EP) allow the experimental results to be checked beyond question. The best such results have been obtained in a remarkable series of experiments using slowly rotating torsion balances1 that have found no violation to 10− ...
The small satellite "Galileo Galilei" (GG) has been designed to test the equivalence pr... more The small satellite "Galileo Galilei" (GG) has been designed to test the equivalence principle (EP) to 10-17 with a total mass at launch of 250 kg. The key instrument is a differential accelerometer made up of weakly coupled coaxial, concentric test cylinders rapidly spinning around the symmetry axis and sensitive in the plane perpendicular to it, lying at a small inclination from the orbit plane. The whole spacecraft spins around the same symmetry axis so as to be passively stabilized. The test masses are large (10 kg each, to reduce thermal noise), their coupling is very weak (for high sensitivity to differential effects), and rotation is fast (for high frequency modulation of the signal). A 1 g version of the accelerometer ("Galileo Galilei on the Ground" --- GGG) has been built to the full scale --- except for coupling, which cannot be as weak as in the absence of weight, and a motor to maintain rotation (not needed in space due to angular momentum conservation). GGG has proved: (i) high Q; (ii) auto-centering and long term stability; (iii) a sensitivity to EP testing which is close to the target sensitivity of the GG experiment provided that the physical properties of the experiment in space are going to be fully exploited.
The GG ("Galileo Galilei") satellite experiment aims to test the Equivalence Principle ... more The GG ("Galileo Galilei") satellite experiment aims to test the Equivalence Principle (EP) to 10-17 , an extremely ambitious goal (due to improve current best results by 4 orders of magnitude) that should tell us in a clear cut way whether we are in the presence of a new long-range physical interaction (violation) or not (confirmation). Either way, it would
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