FRB 121102 casts new light on the photon mass

Bonetti, Luca; Ellis, John; Mavromatos, Nikolaos; Sakharov, A.; Sarkisyan-Grinbaum, E.; Spallicci, A.

doi:10.1016/j.physletb.2017.03.014

Cited by 72 publications

(105 citation statements)

References 34 publications

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“…It is worth stressing the advantages of the method for placing limits on the WEP and the photon mass using the timefrequency structure of the sub-pulses of, e.g., FRB 121102. E x t r a g a l a c t i c r a d i o p u l s a r 2 0 1 6 1 9 9 9 1 9 6 9 m γ ( g ) (Lovell et al 1964), Crab nebula pulsar (Warner & Nather 1969) and GRB 980703 (Schaefer 1999), extragalacitc radio pulsars (Wei & Wu 2018), FRB 150418 Bonetti et al 2016), FRB 121102 (Bonetti et al 2017) and FRB 121102 sub-pulses.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Limits on the Weak Equivalence Principle and Photon Mass with FRB 121102 Subpulses

Xing

Gao

Wei

et al. 2019

ApJL

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Fast radio bursts (FRBs) are short duration (∼millisecond) radio transients with cosmological origin. The simple sharp features of the FRB signal have been utilized to probe two fundamental laws of physics, namey, testing Einstein's weak equivalence principle and constraining the rest mass of the photon. Recently, Hessels et al. (2018) found that after correcting for dispersive delay, some of the bursts in FRB 121102 have complex time-frequency structures that include sub-pulses with a time-frequency downward drifting property. Using the delay time between sub-pulses in FRB 121102, here we show that the parameterized post-Newtonian parameter γ is the same for photons with different energies to the level of |γ 1 − γ 2 | < 2.5 × 10 −16 , which is 1000 times better than previous constraints from FRBs using similar methods. We also obtain a stringent constraint on the photon mass, m γ < 5.1 × 10 −48 g, which is 10 times smaller than previous best limits on the photon mass derived through the velocity dispersion method.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Limits on the Weak Equivalence Principle and Photon Mass with FRB 121102 Subpulses

Xing

Gao

Wei

et al. 2019

ApJL

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show abstract

“…Constraints on the photon mass also arise from cosmological observations of gamma ray bursts [87], extra-galactic pulsars [88,89] and fast radio bursts [90][91][92], which give the tightest constraint m γ 10 −14 eV. These constraints are significantly weaker than those obtained from cosmological measurements.…”

Section: Photon Massmentioning

confidence: 99%

Symmetron scalar fields: Modified gravity, dark matter, or both?

et al. 2019

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Scalar fields coupled to gravity through the Ricci scalar have been considered both as dark matter candidates and as a possible modified gravity explanation for galactic dynamics. It has recently been demonstrated that the dynamics of baryonic matter in disk galaxies may be explained, in the absence of particle dark matter, by a symmetron scalar field that mediates a fifth force. The symmetron provides a concrete and archetypal field theory within which to explore how large a role modifications of gravity can play on galactic scales. In this article, we extend these previous works by asking whether the same symmetron field can explain the difference between the baryonic and lens masses of galaxies through a modification of gravity. We consider the possibilities for minimal modifications of the model and find that this difference cannot be explained entirely by the symmetron fifth force without extending the field content of the model. Instead, we are pushed towards a regime of parameter space where one scalar field both mediates a fifth force and stores enough energy density that it also contributes to the galaxy's gravitational potential as a dark matter component, a regime which remains to be fully explored.

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“…Compared with previous limits from a single pulsar in each of the LMC and SMC [14], our 95% confidence-level constraints from statistical samples are equally good. Although our limits on the photon mass are two orders of magnitude worse than the current best limit from a single FRB [10][11][12], there is merit to the results. First, thanks to our improved statistical technique and the adoption of a more complete data set, our constraints are much more statistically robust than previous results.…”

Section: Summary and Discussionmentioning

confidence: 58%

Robust limits on photon mass from statistical samples of extragalactic radio pulsars

Wei

2018

J. Cosmol. Astropart. Phys.

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The photon zero-mass hypothesis has been investigated for a long time using the frequency-dependent time delays of radio emissions from astrophysical sources. However, the search for a rest mass of the photon has been hindered by the similarity between the frequency-dependent dispersions due to the plasma and nonzero photon mass effects. Considering the contributions to the observed dispersion measure from both the plasma and nonzero photon mass effects, and assuming the dispersion induced by the plasma effect is an unknown constant, we obtain a robust limit on the photon mass by directly fitting a combination of the dispersion measures of radio sources. Using the observed dispersion measures from two statistical samples of extragalactic pulsars, here we show that at the 68% confidence level, the constraints on the photon mass can be as low as m γ ≤ 1.51 × 10 −48 kg ≃ 8.47 × 10 −13 eV/c 2 for the sample of 22 radio pulsars in the Large Magellanic Cloud and m γ ≤ 1.58 × 10 −48 kg ≃ 8.86 × 10 −13 eV/c 2 for the other sample of 5 radio pulsars in the Small Magellanic Cloud, which are comparable with that obtained by a single extragalactic pulsar. Furthermore, the statistical approach presented here can also be used when more fast radio bursts with known redshifts are detected in the future.

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FRB 121102 casts new light on the photon mass

Cited by 72 publications

References 34 publications

Limits on the Weak Equivalence Principle and Photon Mass with FRB 121102 Subpulses

Limits on the Weak Equivalence Principle and Photon Mass with FRB 121102 Subpulses

Symmetron scalar fields: Modified gravity, dark matter, or both?

Robust limits on photon mass from statistical samples of extragalactic radio pulsars

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