Optomechanical Schrödinger cat states in a cavity Bose-Einstein condensate

Abstract

Schrödinger cat states, consisting of superpositions of macroscopically distinct states, provide key resources for a large number of emerging quantum technologies in quantum information processing. Here we propose how to generate and manipulate mechanical and optical Schrödinger cat states with distinguishable superposition components by exploiting the unique properties of cavity optomechanical systems based on Bose-Einstein condensate. Specifically, we show that in comparison with its solid-state counterparts, almost a 3 order of magnitude enhancement in the size of the mechanical Schrödinger cat state could be achieved, characterizing a much smaller overlap between its two superposed coherent-state components. By exploiting this generated cat state, we further show how to engineer the quadrature squeezing of the mechanical mode. Besides, we also provide an efficient method to create multicomponent optical Schrödinger cat states in our proposed scheme. Our work opens up a new way to achieve nonclassical states of massive objects, facilitating the development of fault-tolerant quantum processors and sensors.