Optics and Photonics News April 19, 2019
A team of researchers in the US (University of Rochester, Los Alamos National Laboratory) used feedback loops to optomechanically manipulate the oscillations of a silica nanosphere levitated in an optical trap. In so doing, they were able to create laser-like amplification and coherence of phonons—quanta of vibrational or acoustic energy, analogous to photons in the optical domain. The team believes that the setup opens a general technique for creating frequency-tunable sound lasers in a system-size range that hasn’t previously been explored. The result, according to the researchers, could provide a useful tool both in metrology and sensing, and in more theoretical study of quantum states and quantum information…read more. TECHNICAL ARTICLE
A phonon laser using an optically levitated nanoparticle. Crédit: A. Nick Vamivakas and Michael Osadciw, University of Rochester illustration.