Optimal limits of cavity optomechanical cooling in the strong coupling regime

TL;DR

This paper develops a comprehensive framework for cavity-assisted backaction cooling of mesoscopic mechanical resonators in the strong coupling regime, identifying optimal conditions and dynamic strategies to enhance cooling efficiency.

Contribution

It introduces a general theoretical framework for strong coupling cavity optomechanical cooling and derives optimal conditions for minimal phonon number.

Findings

Cooling oscillates with coupling strength due to frequency mixing.

Optimal cooling occurs when system eigenmodes satisfy frequency matching.

Dynamic dissipative cooling approaches can further reduce phonon numbers.

Abstract

Laser cooling of mesoscopic mechanical resonators is of great interest for both fundamental studies and practical applications. We provide a general framework to describe the cavity-assisted backaction cooling in the strong coupling regime. By studying the cooling dynamics, we find that the temporal evolution of mean phonon number oscillates as a function of the optomechanical coupling strength depending on frequency mixing. The further analytical result reveals that the optimal cooling limit is obtained when the system eigenmodes satisfy the frequency matching condition. The reduced instantaneous-state cooling limits with dynamic dissipative cooling approach are also presented. Our study provides a guideline for optimizing the backaction cooling of mesoscopic mechanical resonators in the strong coupling regime.