Related papers: Position measurement of a levitated nanoparticle v…
We experimentally study the interference of dipole scattered light from two optically levitated nanoparticles in vacuum, which present an environment free of particle-substrate interactions. We illuminate the two trapped nanoparticles with…
Radiofrequency (RF) traps enable highly controlled interactions between charged particles, including reactions between cold molecular ions, sympathetic cooling of one ion species with another, and quantum logic spectroscopy. However, the…
We demonstrate the measurement of nanoparticle shape by angularly resolved Rayleigh scattering of single optical levitated particles that are oriented in space via the trapping light in vacuum. This technique is applied to a range of…
Mechanical oscillators based on levitated particles are promising candidates for sensitive detectors and platforms for testing fundamental physics. The targeted quality factors for such oscillators correspond to extremely low damping rates…
We report quantum ground state cooling of a levitated nanoparticle in a room temperature environment. Using coherent scattering into an optical cavity we cool the center of mass motion of a $143$ nm diameter silica particle by more than $7$…
The evanescent field outside an optical nanofiber (ONF) can create optical traps for neutral atoms. We present a non-destructive method to characterize such trapping potentials. An off-resonance linearly polarized probe beam that propagates…
Event-based imaging is a neurmorphic detection technique whereby an array of pixels detects a positive or negative change in light intensity at each pixel, and is hence particularly well suited to detecting motion. As compared to standard…
Optically levitated nanospheres are highly sensitive to the motion of their center of mass even under small momentum transfer. We propose detecting exotic particles via nucleon scattering in such spheres in the context of an ongoing…
For experiments with ions confined in a Paul trap, minimization of micromotion is often essential. In order to diagnose and compensate micromotion we have implemented a method that allows for finding the position of the radio-frequency (RF)…
We develop the theory describing the quantum coupled dynamics of the center-of-mass motion of a nanoparticle and an ensemble of ions co-trapped in a dual-frequency linear Paul trap. We first derive analytical expressions for the motional…
The levitation of condensed matter in vacuum allows the study of its physical properties under extreme isolation from the environment. It also offers a venue to investigate quantum mechanics with large systems, at the transition between the…
We investigate melting and undercooling in nanoscale (radius ~100 nm) gold particles that are levitated in a quadrupole ion (Paul) trap in a high vacuum environment. The particle is heated via laser illumination and probed using two main…
We perform free-fall experiments with a charge-neutral, optically levitated nanoparticle. This is achieved using an optical tweezer that can be rapidly toggled on and off and vertically displaced, enabling the particle to be released and…
Optically-levitated nanoparticles in vacuum offer a pristine platform for high-quality mechanical oscillators, enabling a wide range of precision measurements and quantum technologies. A key performance metric in such systems is the…
The ability to trap and to manipulate individual atoms is at the heart of current implementations of quantum simulations, quantum computing, and long-distance quantum communication. Controlling the motion of larger particles opens up yet…
The sensitivity of a mechanical transducer is ultimately limited by its inherent quantum fluctuations. Here, we use an optically levitated nanoparticle to measure impulsive forces smaller than the particle's zero-point momentum uncertainty.…
We report on the first feedback cooling of a single trapped ion below the Doppler limit of $\hbar\Gamma/2 k_\mathrm{B}$. The motion of a single ion is monitored in real-time and cooled up to 9-times below the Doppler cooling temperature by…
Optically levitated nanoparticles offer enormous potential for precision sensing. However, as for any other metrology device, the absolute measurement performance of a levitated-particle sensor is limited by the accuracy of the calibration…
We show theoretically that the noise due to laser induced backaction acting on a small nanosphere levitated in a standing-wave trap can be considerably reduced by utilising a suitable reflective boundary. We examine the spherical mirror…
We experimentally realize cavity cooling of all three translational degrees of motion of a levitated nanoparticle in vacuum. The particle is trapped by a cavity-independent optical tweezer and coherently scatters tweezer light into the blue…