Abstract
Wave mixing is an archetypical phenomenon in bosonic systems. In optomechanics, the bidirectional conversion between electromagnetic waves or photons at optical frequencies and elastic waves or phonons at radio frequencies is building on precisely this fundamental principle. Surface acoustic waves (SAWs) provide a versatile interconnect on a chip and thus enable the optomechanical control of remote systems. Here we report on the coherent nonlinear three-wave mixing between the coherent fields of two radio frequency SAWs and optical laser photons via the dipole transition of a single quantum dot exciton. In the resolved sideband regime, we demonstrate fundamental acoustic analogues of sum and difference frequency generation between the two SAWs and employ phase matching to deterministically enhance or suppress individual sidebands. This transfer between the acoustic and optical domains is described by theory that fully takes into account direct and virtual multiphonon processes. Finally, we show that the precision of the wave mixing is limited by the frequency accuracy of modern radio frequency electronics.
Highlights
The phenomenon of wave mixing is well known in nonlinear optics [1] and has been widely employed in numerous other wave phenomena [2,3,4,5]
We have demonstrated optomechanical nonlinear three-wave mixing of two mutually coherent surface acoustic waves (SAWs) fields and the optical field of a laser via the optical transition of a single quantum dots (QDs)
While our particular implementation is based on epitaxial QDs made of III-V compound semiconductors, many other systems like defect centers in diamond [19,21], silicon carbide [20] or two-dimensional materials [48] have already been proven to be well suited to be interfaced with SAWs
Summary
The phenomenon of wave mixing is well known in nonlinear optics [1] and has been widely employed in numerous other wave phenomena [2,3,4,5]. In optomechanics, coherent transduction between optical and radio frequencies has been achieved [6,7], recently in the limit of single vibrational and optical quanta [8] In this field, surface acoustic waves (SAWs) [9] provide a versatile bus enabling the control of remote systems on a chip, both in the classical regime [10,11] and approaching the quantum domain [12]. Because our system is operated in the resolved sideband regime, sum and difference frequency generation processes between the two SAWs occur, which are directly observed in the scattered photon spectrum This transfer between acoustic and optical domains obeys phase-matching conditions between the two SAWs, enabling the deliberate enhancement or suppression of optical spectral. We show that the precision of the wave mixing is limited by the frequency accuracy of modern radio frequency electronics
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