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Progress Toward Detection of Individual TLS in Nanomechanical Resonators

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Abstract

The low-temperature properties of amorphous solids are usually explained in terms of atomic-scale tunneling two level systems (TLS). For almost 20 years, individual TLS have been probed in insulating layers of superconducting quantum circuits. Detecting individual TLS in mechanical systems has been proposed but not definitively demonstrated. We describe an optomechanical system that is appropriate for this goal and describe our progress toward achieving it. In particular, we show that the expected coupling between the mechanical mode and a resonant TLS is strong enough for high visibility of a TLS given the linewidth of the mechanical mode. Furthermore, the electronic noise level of our measurement system is low enough, and the anomalous force noise observed in other nanomechanical devices is absent.

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Acknowledgements

We acknowledge support from the European Research Council under StG UNIGLASS Grant No. 714692 (A.F.) The research leading to these results has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 Research and Innovation program, under Grant No. 824109, the European Microkelvin Platform. We acknowledge the facilities and technical support of Otaniemi research infrastructure for Micro and Nanotechnologies (OtaNano) (M.S.). This work was supported by the Academy of Finland (contracts 352189, 352932, and 336810) (M.S.), and by the European Research Council (contract 101019712) (M.S.), and by the QuantERA II Program (contract 13352189) (M.S.).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Université Grenoble Alpes, CNRS, Grenoble INP, Institut Néel, Grenoble, France

    Richard Pedurand, Ilya Golokolenov, Eddy Collin & Andrew Fefferman

  2. Department of Applied Physics, Aalto University, Aalto, Finland

    Mika Sillanpää & Laure Mercier de Lépinay

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  1. Richard Pedurand
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  2. Ilya Golokolenov
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Contributions

R.P. and I.G. upgraded the measurement system, made the measurements and analyzed the data. M.S. and L.M. de L. designed and fabricated the sample. A.F. designed the experiment. A.F. and E.C. supervised the work. A.F. wrote the manuscript text and all authors reviewed the manuscript.

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Correspondence to Andrew Fefferman.

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Pedurand, R., Golokolenov, I., Sillanpää, M. et al. Progress Toward Detection of Individual TLS in Nanomechanical Resonators. J Low Temp Phys (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10909-024-03072-7

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