• Accepted Paper

Repulsive gravitational force as a witness of the quantum nature of gravity

Pablo L. Saldanha, Chiara Marletto, and Vlatko Vedral

Phys. Rev. A - Accepted 15 October, 2026

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1103/df22-8kb6

Abstract

We show that a single spatially superposed source' mass acting on aprobe’ matter wavepacket can reveal the quantum nature of the gravitational field. For this we use a specific state preparation and measurement of the superposed source mass, including a postselection, which altogether results in a repulsive gravitational force on the probe particle. A classical gravitational field can never lead to repulsion, as the effect requires quantum interference of two distinct states of gravity. The eventual observation of such an effect could be seen as a violation of Einstein’s theory of general relativity, where gravity is always attractive. We also present a calculation in the Heisenberg picture under the formalism of weak values that illustrates how repulsion is achieved. Finally, we estimate the range of parameters (masses and the spatio-temporal extent of interference) for which the experiment is feasible.

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