Upcoming Colloquia

Thursday Feb 11
PAA - Rm. A-118
Qiang Lin (CalTech)
Title:Manipulating Motion with Light: Cavity Optomechanics in Nanophotonic Structures
Abstract: Optical control of mechanical motion underlies a variety of applications ranging from laser cooling to optical tweezing, playing a critical role across many multidisciplinary fields extending from atomic physics to molecular biology. In this talk, I will discuss our recent progress in enhancing the relatively weak force exerted by photons through specially designed coupled-disk nano-optomechanical structures. The dramatically enhanced optical force introduces strong nonlinear coupling between the mechanical and optical degrees of freedom of nanophotonic cavities, enabling precise engineering of the optomechanical properties and sensitive probing of the mechanical motion through the optical wave dynamics. This provides a new testbed to study fundamental physics such as quantum optomechanical dynamics at the mesoscopic scale, and also allows to realize novel optical functionalities unprecedented by conventional approaches. I will give a brief overview of the current state of optomechanical research, then will move on to discuss our work on how to use this type of force to excite regenerative mechanical oscillation, cool the mechanical thermal Brownian motion, optically modify the mechanical rigidity, and to induce EIT-like coherent mixing of optomechanical excitations, as well as how to utilize these cavity-optomechanical effects for on-chip photonic signal processing such as broadband wavelength routing, fast optical switching, and other applications.

Recent Department News

Work of UW Physicists Appears in Science Magazine

Efimov States Found

A Celebration of Prof. Sam Fain

Weekly Seminar Schedule

Available Positions in the Department

Archived News Articles

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The work of UW Physicists appears in Science Magazine. The article is titled "Phase Transitions of Adsorbed Atoms on the Surface of a Carbon Nanotube"

The UW has also issued a press release

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First predicted almost 40 years ago,  Efimov States recently have been created in atomic systems.

In 1970, UW Physics Department Lecturer Vitaly Efimov (then at the Ioffe Physico-Technical Institute, St. Petersburg, Russia) predicted a very strange phenomenon, which is now widely known as Efimov effect. If two bosons interact in such a way that a two-body bound state is exactly on the verge of being formed, then in a three-boson system one should observe an infinite number of bound states. All these states are very similar to one another, differing essentially in scale only. If one would be able to change the interaction strength, by making it either weaker or stronger, the number of three-body bound states would become finite. What is even more strange is the fact that this phenomenon can be observed only in a three dimensional system and only in a three-body system. For many years, researchers have sought two-body systems with such finely tuned properties that by adding the third body one would be able to observe the remarkable and very delicate quantum phenomenon of Efimov states. Only recently has Nature been kind enough to provide such a system; atomic physicists have learned how to manipulate the interaction strength between atoms. Several atomic experimental groups now have been able to demonstrate that Efimov states really exist and have the properties predicted long ago by Professor Efimov. A scientific meeting in Rome, Italy,  has been organized and dedicated to the physics of this remarkable quantum phenomenon:  "Efimov States in Molecules and Nuclei: Theoretical Methods and New Experiments," see http://www.cfa.harvard.edu/itamp/efimovschedule.html.  Professor Efimov will be the guest of honor at this meeting. Congratulations, Professor Efimov!

Former colleagues and friends of Professor Emeritus Sam Fain, with support from the Department of Physics and the Center for Nanotechnology at the University of Washington have organized a colloquium and two seminars to be given by former graduate students of Sam on Monday, November 16 and Tuesday, November 17, preceded by a reception also on Monday, November 16.

More details and a complete schedule can be found here

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