Floquet dynamics in quantum measurement of mechanical motion

Understand

The radiation-pressure interaction between one or more laser fields and a mechanical oscillator gives rise to a wide range of phenomena: from sideband cooling and backaction-evading measurements to pondermotive and mechanical squeezing to entanglement and motional sideband asymmetry.

• In many protocols, such as dissipative mechanical squeezing, multiple lasers are utilized, giving rise to periodically driven optomechanical systems.
• Here we show that in this case, Floquet dynamics can arise due to presence of Kerr-type nonlinearities, which are ubiqitious in optomechanical systems.
• Specifically, employing multiple probe tones, we perform sideband asymmetry measurements, a macroscopic quantum effect, on a silicon optomechanical crystal sideband-cooled to 40% ground-state occupation.