Space-borne Atom Interferometry for Tests of General Relativity *

Quantum sensors based on the interference of matter waves provide an exceptional access to test the postulates of general relativity by comparing the free-fall acceleration of matter waves of different composition. Space-borne quantum tests of the universality of free fall (UFF) promise to exploit the full potential of these sensors due to long free-fall times, and to reach unprecedented performance beyond current limits set by classical experiments.

In this contribution, we present a dedicated satellite mission to test the UFF with ultra-cold atoms to 10^-17 as proposed to the ESA Voyage 2050 initiative [Battelier et al., arXiv:1908.11785 (2019)]. To this end, we highlight our model for suppressing spurious error terms [Loriani et al., PRD 102, 124043 (2020)] and outline our work on a dedicated simulator for satellite-based atom interferometry, which will be an indispensable tool for the detailed analysis of future space mission scenarios.