Neutron interferometer experiments have served as elegant demonstrations of the foundations of quantum mechanics. We show here two interferometer-experiments: one is the demonstration of a geometric phase in a split-beam experiment and the other is the measurement of off-diagonal geometric phase acquired in an evolution of a 1/2-spin system. The former was accomplished with the use of a two-loop neutron interferometer, where a reference beam can be added to the beam from one interference ioop. The combination of phase shifters and partial absorbers permitted the compensation of the dynamical phase and measurement of the geometric phase. The latter is investigated by means of a polarized neutron interferometer. Final counts with and without the polarization analysis enabled us to observe both the off-diagonal and diagonal geometric phases in two detectors. All experimental results show complete agreement with theoretical treatments.

Date Published: 22 July 2002
PDF: 11 pages
Proc. SPIE 4888, First International Workshop on Classical and Quantum Interference, (22 July 2002); doi: 10.1117/12.475883

Published in SPIE Proceedings Vol. 4888:
First International Workshop on Classical and Quantum Interference
Jan Perina; Miroslav Hrabovsky; Jaromir Krepelka, Editor(s)