The cold atom gravimeter (CAG) has proven to be a powerful quantum sensor for the high-precision measurement of gravity field, which can work stably for a long time in the laboratory. However, most CAGs cannot operate in the field due to their complex structure, large volume and poor environmental adaptability. In this paper, a home-made, miniaturized CAG is developed and a truck-borne system based on it is integrated to measure the absolute gravity in the field. The measurement performance of this system is evaluated by applying it to measurements of the gravity field around the Xianlin reservoir in Hangzhou City of China. The internal and external coincidence accuracies of this measurement system were demonstrated to be 35.4 μGal and 76.7 μGal, respectively. Furthermore, the theoretical values of the measured eight points are calculated by using a forward modeling of a local high-resolution digital elevation model, and the calculated values are found to be in good agreement with the measured values. The results of this paper show that this home-made, truck-borne CAG system is reliable, and it is expected to improve the efficiency of gravity surveying in the field.
Shipborne atomic gravimeter (SAG) is an instrument that can directly measure absolute gravity in dynamic environments. As a new type of gravity sensor, a standard method for evaluating its detailed performance has not been proposed and the detailed performance of SAG was rarely reported. In this paper, a system of dynamic gravity measurement, which was integrated with a home-made atomic gravimeter, is demonstrated, and a novel and simple method for testing the performance of SAG on the lake based on the modulated Coriolis effect is put forward. Firstly, in the state of ship mooring, a tilt modulation of the gravity sensor has been realized to make sure the Raman wave vector is parallel to the gravity axis. Moreover, a comparison between the measurement result of CG-5 and SAG has also been carried out to evaluate the accuracy of the SAG. Then, the Coriolis effect modulating experiment is carried out with various routes on lake to test its performance in dynamic environments. In the ship mooring state, the accuracy has been demonstrated to be 0.643 mGal. The internal consistency reliabilities are evaluated to be 0.8 mGal and 1.2 mGal under the conditions of straight line and circle navigation, respectively.