Ultrasensitive nano-optomechanical force sensor operated at dilution temperatures.

Cooling down nanomechanical force probes is a generic strategy to enhance their sensitivities through the concomitant reduction of their thermal noise and mechanical damping rates. However, heat conduction becomes less efficient at low temperatures, which renders difficult to ensure and verify their proper thermalization. Here we implement optomechanical readout techniques operating in the photon counting regime to probe the dynamics of suspended silicon carbide nanowires in a dilution refrigerator.

Inducing micromechanical motion by optical excitation of a single quantum dot.

Hybrid quantum optomechanical systems interface a macroscopic mechanical degree of freedom with a single two-level system such as a single spin, a superconducting qubit or a single optical emitter. Recently, hybrid systems operating in the microwave domain have witnessed impressive progress. Concurrently, only a few experimental approaches have successfully addressed hybrid systems in the optical domain, demonstrating that macroscopic motion can modulate the two-level system transition energy.

Eigenmode orthogonality breaking and anomalous dynamics in multimode nano-optomechanical systems under non-reciprocal coupling.

Thermal motion of nanomechanical probes directly impacts their sensitivities to external forces. Its proper understanding is therefore critical for ultimate force sensing. Here, we investigate a vectorial force field sensor: a singly-clamped nanowire oscillating along two quasi-frequency-degenerate transverse directions.

A universal and ultrasensitive vectorial nanomechanical sensor for imaging 2D force fields.

The miniaturization of force probes into nanomechanical oscillators enables ultrasensitive investigations of forces on dimensions smaller than their characteristic length scales. It also unravels the vectorial character of the force field and how its topology impacts the measurement. Here we present an ultrasensitive method for imaging two-dimensional vectorial force fields by optomechanically following the bidimensional Brownian motion of a singly clamped nanowire.