Gaining confidence on general relativity with cosmic polarization rotation

Sperello di Serego Alighieri

Published 2016-03-11Version 1

The theory of general relativity, for which we celebrate the centennial at this Symposium, is based on the Einstein equivalence principle. This principle could be violated through a pseudoscalar-photon interaction, which would also produce a rotation of the polarization angle for radiation traveling over very long distances. Therefore, if we could show that this cosmic polarization rotation does not exist, our confindence in general relativity would be greatly increased. We review here the astrophysical searches for cosmic polarization rotation, which have been made in the past 26 years using the polarization of radio galaxies and of the cosmic microwave background. So far no rotation has been detected within about 1 degree. We discuss current problems and future prospects for cosmic polarization rotation measurements.