Nano-optics gets quantum (Prof. R. Quidant)

  • Date: May 12, 2015
  • Time: 02:30 PM - 04:00 PM (Local Time Germany)
  • Speaker: Professor Dr. Romain Quidant, ICFO, Barcelona, Spain
  • Room: Herbert Walther Lecture Hall
  • Host: MPQ
Extensive research in Nano-optics over the last decade has made possible controlling optical fields on the nanometer scale. Such concentration of light, well below the limit of diffraction, opens plenty of new routes towards enhanced interaction with tiny amounts of matter down to the single molecule/atom level.

In this talk we will present our recent advances in enhanced light-matter interaction on the nanometer scale and their applications to quantum optics.The first part of the talk focuses on the controlled interaction of Nitrogen Vacancy (NV) centers with optical nanostructures. We first discuss an approach in which light is used to trap and manipulate individual nanodiamonds containing a single NV. We demonstrate both translational and angular control of the trapped NV and discuss potential applications to vectorial magnetometry and mapping of the electromagnetic local density of states. In a second step, our manipulation technique is applied to deterministically locate single nano-diamonds in the hot spot of plasmonic antennas. Last but not least we demonstrate that the hybrid system formed by a single NV coupled to a gold gap antenna can operate as an efficient and fast optical switch upon non-resonant CW illumination.

The second part of the talk presents our latest advances in nano-optical trapping and nano-optomechanics. We first introduce the use of an optically levitating nanoparticle in vacuum as a nano-optomechanical system with unprecedented performances. We describe his unique linear and nonlinear mechanical properties and demonstrate the possibility to cool down its center of mass by applying parametric feed back. We then discuss how the optical near field of resonant plasmonic nanostructures enables us trapping tiny nano-objects under moderate light intensities. Similar to the optical spring effect in high-finesse optical cavities, we demonstrate a pronounced back action effect that both increases the object confinement and relaxes the requirements on the minimum intra-cavity field intensity.

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