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Published October 7, 2014 | Published + Submitted
Journal Article Open

Observation and interpretation of motional sideband asymmetry in a quantum electro-mechanical device

Abstract

Quantum electromechanical systems offer a unique opportunity to probe quantum noise properties in macroscopic devices, properties that ultimately stem from Heisenberg's uncertainty relations. A simple example of this behavior is expected to occur in a microwave parametric transducer, where mechanical motion generates motional sidebands corresponding to the up-and-down frequency conversion of microwave photons. Because of quantum vacuum noise, the rates of these processes are expected to be unequal. We measure this fundamental imbalance in a microwave transducer coupled to a radio-frequency mechanical mode, cooled near the ground state of motion. We also discuss the subtle origin of this imbalance: depending on the measurement scheme, the imbalance is most naturally attributed to the quantum fluctuations of either the mechanical mode or of the electromagnetic field.

Additional Information

© 2014 The Authors. Published by the American Physical Society under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License. Further distribution of this work must maintain attribution to the author(s) and the published article's title, journal citation, and DOI. Received 15 May 2014; revised manuscript received 31 July 2014; published 7 October 2014. We would like to acknowledge Yanbei Chen and Matthew Woolley for helpful discussions. This work is supported by funding provided by the Institute for Quantum Information and Matter, an NSF Physics Frontiers Center with support of the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation (NSF-IQIM 1125565), by DARPA (DARPA-QUANTUM HR0011-10-1-0066), by the NSF (NSF-DMR 1052647 and NSF-EEC 0832819), and by the DARPA ORCHID Program under a grant from AFOSR.

Attached Files

Published - PhysRevX.4.041003.pdf

Submitted - 1404.3242v1.pdf

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August 20, 2023
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