Trouton–Rankine experiment

The Trouton–Rankine experiment was an experiment designed to measure if the Lorentz–FitzGerald contraction of an object according to one frame (as defined by the luminiferous aether) produced a measurable effect in the rest frame of the object, so that the ether would act as a "preferred frame". The experiment was first performed by Frederick Thomas Trouton and Alexander Oliver Rankine in 1908.

The outcome of the experiment was negative, which is in agreement with the principle of relativity (and thus special relativity as well), according to which observers at rest in a certain inertial reference frame, cannot measure their own translational motion by instruments at rest in the same frame. Consequently, also length contraction cannot be measured by co-moving observers. See also Tests of special relativity.