Optomechanical crystals and their quantum optical applications

In the last several years, rapid advances have been made in the field of cavity optomechanics, in which the usually feeble radiation pressure force of light is used to manipulate (and precisely monitor) mechanical motion [1-3]. These advances have moved the field from the multi-km interferometer of a gravitational wave observatory, to the optical table top, and now all the way down to a silicon microchip [4]. In this talk I will describe these advances, and discuss our own work to realize radiation pressure within nanoscale structures in the form of coupled photonic and phononic crystals (dubbed optomechanical crystals; see Figure 1 below) [5]. Applications of these new nano-opto-mechanical systems include: all-optically tunable photonics, optically powered RF and microwave oscillators, and precision force/acceleration and mass sensing. Additionally there is the potential for these systems to be used in hybrid quantum networks, enabling storage or transfer of quantum information between disparate quantum systems. I will introduce several conceptual ideas regarding phonon-photon translation [6] and slow light effects [7] which may be used in such quantum settings, and discuss recent experiments to realize them in practice [8].