A weak equivalence principle test on a suborbital rocket

Understand

We describe a Galilean test of the weak equivalence principle, to be conducted during the free fall portion of a sounding rocket flight.

• The test of a single pair of substances is aimed at a measurement uncertainty of sigma(eta) < 10^-16 after averaging the results of eight separate drops.
• The weak equivalence principle measurement is made with a set of four laser gauges that are expected to achieve 0.1 pm Hz^-1/2.
• The discovery of a violation (eta not equal to 0) would have profound implications for physics, astrophysics, and cosmology.