We investigate the interaction of a transmon qubit with a classical gravitational field. Exploiting the generic phenomena of the gravitational redshift and Aharonov-Bohm phase, we show that entangled quantum states dephase with a universal rate. The gravitational phase shift is expressed in terms of a quantum computing noise channel. We give a measurement protocol based on a modified phase estimation algorithm which is linear in the phase drift, which is optimal for measuring the small phase that is acquired from the gravitation channel. Additionally, we propose qubit-based platforms as quantum sensors for precision gravitometers and mechanical strain gauges as an example of this phenomenon's utility. We estimate a sensitivity for measuring the local gravitational acceleration to be δ g / g ∼ 10 − 7 . This paper demonstrates that classical gravitation has a nontrivial influence on quantum computing hardware and provides an illustration of how quantum computing hardware may be utilized for purposes other than computation. While we focus on superconducting qubits, we point to the universal nature of gravitational phase effects for all quantum platforms.
We investigate the interaction of a transmon qubit with a classical gravitational field. Exploiting the generic phenomena of the gravitational redshift and Aharonov-Bohm phase, we show that entangled quantum states dephase with a universal rate. The gravitational phase shift is expressed in terms of a quantum computing noise channel. We give a measurement protocol based on a modified phase estimation algorithm which is linear in the phase drift, which is optimal for measuring the small phase that is acquired from the gravitation channel. Additionally, we propose qubit-based platforms as quantum sensors for precision gravitometers and mechanical strain gauges as an example of this phenomenon's utility. We estimate a sensitivity for measuring the local gravitational acceleration to be δ g / g ∼ 10 − 7 . This paper demonstrates that classical gravitation has a nontrivial influence on quantum computing hardware and provides an illustration of how quantum computing hardware may be utilized for purposes other than computation. While we focus on superconducting qubits, we point to the universal nature of gravitational phase effects for all quantum platforms.
Quantum processors encode computational information in relative phases and are therefore sensitive to spatially and temporally correlated dephasing. We formulate gravitational redshift as a physically constrained template for such noise. A fixed, known redshift produces a deterministic phase, whereas dephasing arises only when unresolved displacement, timing, or frequency fluctuations are transduced into phase uncertainty; for vertical motion, the conversion factor is β g = ω 0 g / c 0 2 . The gravity-specific content is thus the mapping from geometry fluctuations to phase covariance and frequency-noise spectra, while the resulting Gaussian dephasing dynamics are generic. We test spatial-kernel dependence using exponential, Gaussian, Matérn, and power-law correlations. Circuit-level effects are evaluated with an explicit GHZ-preparation circuit, showing that a full-GHZ-per-layer exponential approximation overestimates loss. For temporal correlations, we derive S δ ω = β g 2 S h and use a mechanically motivated drift-plus-vibration model, which attributes memory to the mechanical process rather than gravity. Platform estimates indicate that the gravity-transduced contribution is negligible compared with present technical dephasing. The framework therefore provides a falsifiable geometry-to-noise model while keeping mitigation and compilation claims quantitatively cautious.
We show that gravitational curvature can control the generation of nonlocal quantum correlations in a hybrid qubit-mechanical device. The tidal field of a nearby source mass modifies the susceptibility of a shared mechanical oscillator, thereby tuning an oscillator-mediated qubit-qubit interaction and the resulting entangling phase. An exact treatment of the dynamics reveals stroboscopic geometric gates whose accumulated phase is directly sensitive to gravitational curvature. Treating the curvature as an unknown parameter, we derive the ultimate quantum limit for its estimation and identify a parity-based measurement that saturates this bound. Solving the full master equation with the mechanical mode retained explicitly, we find that thermal occupation of the mediator suppresses entanglement between the closure times but is undone at each closure, exactly in the unitary limit for any initial mechanical temperature, so that ground-state cooling of the oscillator is not a prerequisite for the protocol. Mechanical damping and qubit dephasing behave differently: they leak branch information irreversibly to the environment, and it is the heating and dephasing rates, rather than the bath occupation alone, that limit the entanglement visibility and the number of usable interrogation loops. In contrast to gravity-mediated entanglement proposals, entanglement is generated by the mechanical oscillator while gravity acts solely as a classical control field. We quantify the achievable curvature parameters; all curvature dependencies are analytic, allowing for exact rescaling of the results. The scheme therefore demonstrates gravitational control of a quantum interaction and provides a route to curvature sensing based on a nonlocal two-qubit phase rather than on local phase measurements.
Quantum computers allow for direct simulation of the quantum interference and entanglement used in modern interferometry experiments with applications ranging from biological sensing to gravitational wave detection. Inspired by recent developments in quantum sensing at the Laser Interferometer Gravitational-wave Observatory (LIGO), here we present two quantum circuit models that demonstrate the role of quantum mechanics and entanglement in modern precision sensors. We implemented these quantum circuits on IBM quantum processors, using a single qubit to represent independent photons traveling through the LIGO interferometer and two entangled qubits to illustrate the improved sensitivity that LIGO has achieved by using non-classical states of light. The one-qubit interferometer illustrates how projection noise in the measurement of independent photons corresponds to phase sensitivity at the standard quantum limit. In the presence of technical noise on a real quantum computer, this interferometer achieves the sensitivity of 11\% above the standard quantum limit. The two-qubit interferometer demonstrates how entanglement circumvents the limits imposed by the quantum shot noise, achieving the phase sensitivity 17\% below the standard quantum limit. These experiments illustrate the role that quantum mechanics plays in setting new records for precision measurements on platforms like LIGO. The experiments are broadly accessible, remotely executable activities that are well suited for introducing undergraduate students to quantum computation, error propagation, and quantum sensing on real quantum hardware.
Testing whether gravity is quantum or classical remains a cornerstone challenge in fundamental physics. We introduce a practical tabletop experiment to probe gravity's quantum nature via the gravitational Aharonov-Bohm (AB) effect in atom interferometry. Our approach hinges on two pivotal insights: First, unlike electromagnetic AB effects where constant charge ensures gauge-invariant phases for closed paths, semiclassical gravity couples to the particle's total energy, rendering the AB phase gauge-dependent and unobservable when energies differ between paths due to environmental noise or controlled perturbations. Second, in quantum gravity—treating source, particle, and field as quantum—the total phase splits into a gauge-dependent particle contribution and a gauge-invariant source backreaction, yielding precisely half the nominal AB phase as observable. This halved phase discriminates quantum from classical gravity without requiring massive superpositions, aligning with existing technology. Remarkably, Overstreet et al.'s (Science 375, 226 (2022)) data already reveal a nonzero measured AB phase, providing the first experimental evidence for gravitational quantization.
The notion of time is given a different footing in quantum mechanics and general relativity, treated as a parameter in the former and being an observer-dependent property in the latter. From an operational point of view time is simply the correlation between a system and a clock, where an idealized clock can be modeled as a two-level system. We investigate the dynamics of clocks interacting gravitationally by treating the gravitational interaction as a classical information channel. This model, known as the classical-channel gravity (CCG), postulates that gravity is mediated by a fundamentally classical force carrier and is therefore unable to entangle particles gravitationally. In particular, we focus on the decoherence rates and temporal resolution of arrays of N clocks, showing how the minimum dephasing rate scales with N, and the spatial configuration. Furthermore, we consider the gravitational redshift between a clock and a massive particle and show that a classical-channel model of gravity predicts a finite-dephasing rate from the nonlocal interaction. In our model we obtain a fundamental limitation in time accuracy that is intrinsic to each clock.
We propose a feasible laboratory interferometry experiment with matter waves in a gravitational potential caused by a pair of artificial field-generating masses. It will demonstrate that the presence of these masses (and, for moving atoms, time dilation) induces a phase shift, even if it does not cause any classical force. The phase shift is identical to that produced by the gravitational redshift (or time dilation) of clocks ticking at the atom's Compton frequency. In analogy to the Aharonov-Bohm effect in electromagnetism, the quantum mechanical phase is a function of the gravitational potential and not the classical forces.