Testing for Lorentz Violation: Constraints on Standard-Model-Extension Parameters via Lunar Laser Ranging

Authors

James B. R. Battat, jbattat@brynmawr.eduFollow
John F. Chandler
Christopher W. Stubbs

Document Type

Article

Version

Publisher's PDF

Publication Title

Physical Review Letters

Volume

99

Publication Date

2007

Abstract

We present constraints on violations of Lorentz invariance based on archival lunar laser-ranging (LLR) data. LLR measures the Earth-Moon separation by timing the round-trip travel of light between the two bodies and is currently accurate to the equivalent of a few centimeters (parts in 10¹¹ of the total distance). By analyzing this LLR data under the standard-model extension (SME) framework, we derived six observational constraints on dimensionless SME parameters that describe potential Lorentz violation. We found no evidence for Lorentz violation at the 10^-6 to 10^-11 level in these parameters. This work constitutes the first LLR constraints on SME parameters.

Publisher's Statement

© 2007 by the American Physical Society. The publisher's version of the article can be found at http://link.aps.org/doi/10.1103/PhysRevLett.99.241103.

Citation

J.B.R. Battat, J.F. Chandler, C.W. Stubbs, Phys. Rev. Lett. 99, 241103 (2007).

DOI

10.1103/PhysRevLett.99.241103