Deterministic Creation of Macroscopic Cat States.

Daniel Lombardo,Jason Twamley

doi:10.1038/srep13884

Abstract

Despite current technological advances, observing quantum mechanical effects outside of the nanoscopic realm is extremely challenging. For this reason, the observation of such effects on larger scale systems is currently one of the most attractive goals in quantum science. Many experimental protocols have been proposed for both the creation and observation of quantum states on macroscopic scales, in particular, in the field of optomechanics. The majority of these proposals, however, rely on performing measurements, making them probabilistic. In this work we develop a completely deterministic method of macroscopic quantum state creation. We study the prototypical optomechanical Membrane In The Middle model and show that by controlling the membrane’s opacity, and through careful choice of the optical cavity initial state, we can deterministically create and grow the spatial extent of the membrane’s position into a large cat state. It is found that by using a Bose-Einstein condensate as a membrane high fidelity cat states with spatial separations of up to ∼300 nm can be achieved.

Highlights

IntroductionIntroduction to Membrane In The Middle (MITM)The Membrane in the Middle model describes an optomechanical system which is comprised from two degenerate modes of a cavity which interact with a physical membrane that is confined within the cavity, shown in Fig. 1. The Hamiltonian for this model can be split into four main pmoorttiioonn,s.HTTh,eswehiincchluddees;cHribC0e, sdethsceritbrainngsmthiesssioelnf energies of light of the cavity through the mmeomdebsr,aHne0Ma,ntdhaHtoinft the membrane’s the interaction energy. The self energy terms are given by, H C 0 = ω (a †La L + a †Ra R), [1] M 0 Ω b †b , [2]where and baˆ L/athat
Our goal is to discover a deterministic protocol for the creation of a cat state of a mechanical object’s position
In this work a quantum system designed for the deterministic creation of macroscopic quantum states is proposed

Summary

Introduction

Introduction to MITMThe Membrane in the Middle model describes an optomechanical system which is comprised from two degenerate modes of a cavity which interact with a physical membrane that is confined within the cavity, shown in Fig. 1. The Hamiltonian for this model can be split into four main pmoorttiioonn,s.HTTh,eswehiincchluddees;cHribC0e, sdethsceritbrainngsmthiesssioelnf energies of light of the cavity through the mmeomdebsr,aHne0Ma,ntdhaHtoinft the membrane’s the interaction energy. The self energy terms are given by, H C 0 = ω (a †La L + a †Ra R), [1] M 0 Ω b †b , [2]where and baˆ L/athat

Objectives

Results

Conclusion