High precision measurement of the topological Aharonov-Casher effect with neutrons

The phase shift predicted by Aharonov and Casher (AC) for a magnetic dipole diffracting around a line charge was first observed by Cimmino et al. using a neutron interferometer. A number of subsequent atom interferometry experiments have been performed to observe this effect. These experiments measured the vxE phase shift due to the magnetic field induced in the rest frame of the atom, with no indication of the topological nature of the AC interaction. We intend to perform a high precision AC experiment with neutrons to improve the accuracy of our previous results and to highlight the topological nature of the effect. Finally, we present a novel geometry to achieve a spin-dependent magnetic phase shift