Measuring space-time fuzziness with high energy γ-ray detectors

INFN Pavia, Via Bassi 6, Pavia, I-27100, Italy

^a Corresponding author. e-mail: paolo.cattaneo@pv.infn.it
^b e-mail: andrea.rappoldi@pv.infn.it

Published online: 23 March 2017

Abstract

There are several suggestions to probe space-time fuzziness (also known as space-time foam) due to the quantum mechanics nature of space-time. These effects are predicted to be very small, being related to the Planck length, so that the only hope to experimentally detect them is to look at particles propagating along cosmological distances. Some phenomenological approaches suggest that photons originating from pointlike sources at cosmological distance experience path length fluctuation that could be detected. Also the direction of flight of such photons may be subject to a dispersion such that the image of a point-like source is blurred and detected as a disk. An experimentally accessible signature may be images of point-like sources larger that the size due to the Point Spread Function of the instrument. This additional broadening should increase with distance and photon energy. Some concrete examples that can be studied with the AGILE and FERMI-LAT γ -ray satellite experiments are discussed.