Colloquia & Guest Speakers
Cooling and Amplification of a Vacuum-Trapped Nanoparticle
Lukas Novotny, PhD, ETH Zurich, Photonics Laboratory
Wednesday, October 7, 2015
11:25 a.m.
Abstract
I discuss our experiments with optically levitated nanoparticles in ultrahigh vacuum. Using an active parametric feedback scheme we cool the particle’s center-of-mass temperature to T ~ 500μK and reach mean quantum occupation numbers of n ~ 50. I show that mechanical quality factors of Q = 109 can be reached and that damping is dominated by photon recoil heating. The vacuum-trapped nanoparticle forms an ideal model system for studying non-equilibrium processes, nonlinear interactions, and ultrasmall forces.
Dr. Novotny is a researcher at ETH Zurich, Photonics Laboratory
Location: Bausch and Lomb 109
Refreshments will be served.