Observation of non-Markovian micromechanical Brownian motion

Author(s)
Simon Gröblacher, A. Trubarov, N. Prigge, G. D. Cole, M. Aspelmeyer, J. Eisert
Abstract

All physical systems are to some extent open and interacting with their environment. This insight, basic as it may seem, gives rise to the necessity of protecting quantum systems from decoherence in quantum technologies and is at the heart of the emergence of classical properties in quantum physics. The precise decoherence mechanisms, however, are often unknown for a given system. In this work, we make use of an opto-mechanical resonator to obtain key information about spectral densities of its condensed-matter heat bath. In sharp contrast to what is commonly assumed in high-temperature quantum Brownian motion describing the dynamics of the mechanical degree of freedom, based on a statistical analysis of the emitted light, it is shown that this spectral density is highly non-Ohmic, reflected by non-Markovian dynamics, which we quantify. We conclude by elaborating on further applications of opto-mechanical systems in open system identification.

Organisation(s)
Quantum Optics, Quantum Nanophysics and Quantum Information
External organisation(s)
Freie Universität Berlin (FU), Delft University of Technology
Journal
Nature Communications
Volume
6
No. of pages
6
ISSN
2041-1723
Publication date
07-2015
Peer reviewed
Yes
Austrian Fields of Science 2012
103026 Quantum optics
Keywords
ASJC Scopus subject areas
General, General Physics and Astronomy, General Chemistry, General Biochemistry,Genetics and Molecular Biology
Portal url
https://ucrisportal.univie.ac.at/en/publications/87189d38-9c28-481a-8294-f1f9f190c569