Quantum theory and general relativity are the current theoretical fundament of our understanding of nature. It is widely known that the principles of quantisation cannot be directly applied to the gravitational field without leading to inconsistency. The topic of this lecture, however, is much closer to our practical experience in the laboratory: it deals with nonrelativistic quantum matter (i. e. such matter that can be described by the Schrödinger equation) and its interaction with the gravitational field. Four major topics will be discussed:
1.) How does quantum matter behave in an external gravitational field? Specifically, does the gravitational field lead to a loss of coherence of a wave function, and how can relativistic effects such as time dilation be modelled for quantum objects?
2.) Which intricacies appear when one attempts to reformulate Einstein's equivalence principle for quantum matter?
3.) How does quantum matter act as a source of gravitational fields, and can we learn something about quantum gravity from the study of quantum states as gravitational source masses?
4.) Does gravity play a role in questions of the foundations and interpretation of quantum mechanics, specifically in the solution of the measurement problem?
Basic knowledge of quantum mechanics is expected, some knowledge in general relativity will be helpful but is not expected. |