No Arabic abstract
We report on measurements performed at low temperatures on a nanoelectromechanical system (NEMS) under (capacitive) parametric pumping. The excitations and detection schemes are purely electrical, and enable in the present experiment the straightforward measurement of forces down to about a femtonewton, for displacements of an Angstrom, using standard room temperature electronics. We demonstrate that a small (linear) force applied on the device can be amplified up to more than a 100 times, while the system is {it truly moving}. We explore the dynamics up to about 50$~$nm deflections for cantilevers about 200$~$nm thick by 3$~$$mu$m long oscillating at a frequency of 7$~$MHz. We present a generic modeling of nonlinear parametric amplification, and give analytic theoretical solutions enabling the fit of experimental results. We finally discuss the practical limits of the technique, with a particular application: the measurement of {it anelastic damping} in the metallic coating of the device with an exceptional resolution of about 0.5$~$%.
We report on experiments performed on a cantilever-based tri-port nano-electro-mechanical (NEMS) device. Two ports are used for actuation and detection through the magnetomotive scheme, while the third port is a capacitively coupled gate electrode. By applying a low frequency voltage signal on the gate, we demonstrate mixing in the mechanical response of the device, even for {it low magnetomotive drives, without resorting to conduction measurements through the NEMS}. The technique can thus be used in particular in the linear regime, as an alternative to nonlinear mixing, for normal conducting devices. An analytic theory is presented reproducing the data without free parameters
We report on experiments performed in vacuum and at cryogenic temperatures on a tri-port nano-electro-mechanical (NEMS) device. One port is a very non-linear capacitive actuation, while the two others implement the magnetomotive scheme with a linear input force port and a (quasi-linear) output velocity port. We present an experimental method enabling a full characterization of the nanomechanical device harmonic response: the non-linear capacitance function $C(x)$ is derived, and the normal parameters $k$ and $m$ (spring constant and mass) of the mode under study are measured through a careful definition of the motion (in meters) and of the applied forces (in Newtons). These results are obtained with a series of purely electric measurements performed without disconnecting/reconnecting the device, and rely only on known DC properties of the circuit, making use of a thermometric property of the oscillator itself: we use the Young modulus of the coating metal as a thermometer, and the resistivity for Joule heating. The setup requires only three connecting lines without any particular matching, enabling the preservation of a high impedance NEMS environment even at MHz frequencies. The experimental data are fit to a detailed electrical and thermal model of the NEMS device, demonstrating a complete understanding of its dynamics. These methods are quite general and can be adapted (as a whole, or in parts) to a large variety of elecromechanical devices.
Nonreciprocal devices such as circulators and isolators belong to an important class of microwave components employed in applications like the measurement of mesoscopic circuits at cryogenic temperatures. The measurement protocols usually involve an amplification chain which relies on circulators to separate input and output channels and to suppress backaction from different stages on the sample under test. In these devices the usual reciprocal symmetry of circuits is broken by the phenomenon of Faraday rotation based on magnetic materials and fields. However, magnets are averse to on-chip integration, and magnetic fields are deleterious to delicate superconducting devices. Here we present a new proposal combining two stages of parametric modulation emulating the action of a circulator. It is devoid of magnetic components and suitable for on-chip integration. As the design is free of any dissipative elements and based on reversible operation, the device operates noiselessly, giving it an important advantage over other nonreciprocal active devices for quantum information processing applications.
We report the observation of a parametric instability in the out-of-equilibrium steady state of two coupled Kerr microresonators coherently driven by a laser. Using a resonant excitation, we drive the system into an unstable regime, where we observe the appearance of intense and well resolved sideband modes in the emission spectrum. This feature is a characteristic signature of self-sustained oscillations of the intracavity field. We comprehensively model our findings using semiclassical Langevin equations for the cavity field dynamics combined with a linear stability analysis. The inherent scalability of our semiconductor platform, enriched with a strong Kerr nonlinearity, is promising for the realization of integrated optical parametric oscillator networks operating in a few-photon regime.
A driven-dissipative nonlinear photonic system (e.g. exciton-polaritons) can operate in a gapped superfluid regime. We theoretically demonstrate that the reflection of a linear wave on this superfluid is an analogue of the Andreev reflection of an electron on a superconductor. A normal region surrounded by two superfluids is found to host Andreev-like bound states. These bound states form topological synthetic bands versus the phase difference between the two superfluids. Changing the width of the normal region allows to invert the band topology and to create interface states. Instead of demonstrating a linear crossing, synthetic bands are attracted by the non-linear non-Hermitian coupling of bosonic systems which gives rise to a self-amplified strongly occupied topological state.