QI On PubPhys: open In the literature: partially resolved Compiled by AI, not yet reviewed by an editor

Does any parameter window of white-noise CSL remain viable?

This text mentions work from 2024 on. Those parts were partly written without a live literature search and have not been checked by an editor yet.

In plain words

The best-studied collapse model, continuous spontaneous localization (CSL), has two numbers: how often collapse happens and over what distance. In 2025 a dark-matter detector excluded the originally proposed values; the question is whether any values remain that still collapse visible objects fast enough.

Precise statement

Markovian (white-noise) CSL has collapse rate $\lambda$ and correlation length $r_{C}$. X-ray spontaneous emission in XENONnT gives $\lambda / r_{C}^{2} < 3.0 \times 10^{-7}\,\mathrm{s}^{-1}\,\mathrm{cm}^{-2}$ (90 percent C.L.) for $r_{C}$ below about $10^{-3}\,\mathrm{cm}$; mechanical and interferometric bounds cover larger $r_{C}$. Theoretical lower bounds require collapse of a barely visible object within about $10^{-2}\,\mathrm{s}$. Determine whether the region between experimental upper bounds and theoretical lower bounds is empty for all $r_{C}$.

What would settle it

Spontaneous-radiation, heating and interferometric bounds that, with an agreed macroscopic-collapse criterion, exclude or leave open a region of the $(\lambda, r_C)$ plane.

Status in the literature

Unverified note: it names recent work and was partly written without a live literature search; it awaits a check by an editor.

XENONnT (Phys. Rev. Lett. 136, 120201, 2026) excluded the GRW values $\lambda = 10^{-16}\ \mathrm{s}^{-1}$, $r_{C} = 10^{-5}\ \mathrm{cm}$ at $9.1\sigma$, improving the previous X-ray bound about 135-fold.

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