Science Daily April 7, 2022
In an optical resonator light is reflected between mirrors, and it interacts with the levitated nanoparticle. Such interaction can give rise to dynamical instabilities which are often considered undesirable. An international team of researchers (Austria, Switzerland)
has shown how they can be used as a resource. They have shown that by properly controlling these instabilities, the resulting unstable dynamics of a mechanical oscillator inside an optical cavity leads to mechanical squeezing. They applied this approach to a silica nanoparticle coupled to a microcavity via coherent scattering. The new protocol is robust in the presence of dissipation, making it particularly feasible in levitated optomechanics. The work provides a new use of optical cavities as mechanical quantum squeezers, and it suggests a viable new route in levitated optomechanics beyond the quantum ground state cooling. Micro-resonators thus offer an interesting new platform for the design of quantum sensors, which could be used in satellite missions, self-driving cars, and in seismology…read more. TECHNICAL ARTICLE
Asymptotic mechanical squeezing in the presence of dissipation… Credit: Phys. Rev. Lett. 128, 143601, 6 April 2022Â