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Engineering dissipation with phononic spectral hole burning

Nature Materials volume 16, pages 315–321 (2017)Cite this article

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Abstract

Optomechanics, nano-electromechanics, and integrated photonics have brought about a renaissance in phononic device physics and technology. Central to this advance are devices and materials supporting ultra-long-lived photonic and phononic excitations that enable novel regimes of classical and quantum dynamics based on tailorable photon–phonon coupling. Silica-based devices have been at the forefront of such innovations for their ability to support optical excitations persisting for nearly 1 billion cycles, and for their low optical nonlinearity. While acoustic phonon modes can persist for a similar number of cycles in crystalline solids at cryogenic temperatures, it has not been possible to achieve such performance in silica, as silica becomes acoustically opaque at low temperatures. We demonstrate that these intrinsic forms of phonon dissipation are greatly reduced (by >90%) by nonlinear saturation using continuous drive fields of disparate frequencies. The result is a form of steady-state phononic spectral hole burning that produces a wideband transparency window with optically generated phonon fields of modest (nW) powers. We developed a simple model that explains both dissipative and dispersive changes produced by phononic saturation. Our studies, conducted in a microscale device, represent an important step towards engineerable phonon dynamics on demand and the use of glasses as low-loss phononic media.

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Figure 1: Modification of elastic properties by phononic spectral hole burning.
Figure 2: System and Brillouin scattering spectroscopy.
Figure 3: Phononic spectral hole burning experimental set-up, phenomenology, and results.
Figure 4: Modification of acoustic dissipation and dispersion by phononic spectral hole burning.
Figure 5: Acoustic quality factor with temperature and drive intensity in a system where absorption by acoustic atoms dominates dissipation (ΓR ≫ Γ0).

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Acknowledgements

The authors thank P. Fleury, H. Shin, E. Kittlaus, N. Otterstrom and S. Gertler for a number of thoughtful criticisms and suggestions. Primary support for this work was provided by NSF MRSEC DMR-1119826. This work was supported in part by the Packard Fellowship for Science and Engineering as well as Yale University startup funding.

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  1. Department of Applied Physics, Yale University, New Haven, Connecticut 06511, USA

    R. O. Behunin, P. Kharel, W. H. Renninger & P. T. Rakich

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Contributions

R.O.B., P.K. and P.T.R. conceived, designed, and built the spectral hole burning experiments with the assistance of W.H.R. R.O.B. and P.K. performed the measurements and analysed the data with the assistance of W.H.R. and P.T.R. R.O.B. and P.T.R. developed the spectral hole burning theory with assistance from P.K. and W.H.R. All authors contributed to the writing of this paper.

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Correspondence to R. O. Behunin or P. T. Rakich.

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Behunin, R., Kharel, P., Renninger, W. et al. Engineering dissipation with phononic spectral hole burning. Nature Mater 16, 315–321 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1038/nmat4819

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