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Nature Nanotechnology, Nov
Andreas Jöckel, Aline Faber, Tobias Kampschulte, Maria Korppi, Matthew T. Rakher, Philipp Treutlein.
Departement Physik, Universität Basel, CH-4056 Basel, Switzerland.
ABSTRACT
Sympathetic cooling with ultracold atoms1 and atomic ions2 enables ultralow temperatures in systems where direct laser or evaporative cooling is not possible. It has so far been limited to the cooling of other microscopic particles, with masses up to 90 times larger than that of the coolant atom3. Here, we use ultracold atoms to sympathetically cool the vibrations of a Si3N4nanomembrane4, 5, the mass of which exceeds that of the atomic ensemble by a factor of 1010. The coupling of atomic and membrane vibrations is mediated by laser light over a macroscopic distance6, 7 and is enhanced by placing the membrane in an optical cavity8. We observe cooling of the membrane vibrations from room temperature to 650 ± 230 mK, exploiting the large atom–membrane cooperativity9 of our hybrid optomechanical system10, 11. With technical improvements, our scheme could provide ground-state cooling and quantum control of low-frequency oscillators such as nanomembranes or levitated nanoparticles12, 13, in a regime where purely optomechanical techniques cannot reach the ground state8, 9.
Significance Statement:
Physicists from Basel University have developed a new cooling technique for mechanical quantum systems. Using an ultracold atomic gas, the vibrations of a membrane were cooled down to less than 1 degree above absolute zero. This technique may enable novel studies of quantum physics and precision measurement devices.
