Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen steering and Bell nonlocality of two macroscopic mechanical oscillators in optomechanical systems

TL;DR

This paper explores how quantum nonlocal effects like EPR steering and Bell nonlocality can be observed in two macroscopic mechanical oscillators within optomechanical systems, using reservoir engineering and specific measurement techniques.

Contribution

It demonstrates the feasibility of achieving robust EPR steering and Bell nonlocality in macroscopic systems under realistic conditions, with detailed analysis of measurement strategies.

Findings

Large and robust EPR steering can be achieved in steady state.

Bell nonlocality requires stringent conditions, especially for parity detection.

Bell violation with on-off detection is more experimentally feasible.

Abstract

We investigate under which conditions quantum nonlocal manifestations as Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen steering or Bell nonlocality can manifest themselves even at the macroscopic level of two mechanical resonators in optomechanical systems. We adopt the powerful scheme of reservoir engineering, implemented by driving a cavity mode with a properly chosen two-tone field, to prepare two mechanical oscillators into an entangled state. We show that large and robust (both one-way and two-way) steering could be achieved in the steady state with realistic parameters. We analyze the mechanism of the asymmetric nature of steering in our system of two-mode Gaussian state. However, unlike steering, Bell nonlocality is present under much more stringent conditions. We consider two types of measurements, displaced parity and on-off detection, respectively. We show that for both the measurements Bell violation requires very low environmental temperature. For the parity detection, large Bell violation is observed only in the transient state when the mechanical modes decouple from the optical mode and with extremely small cavity losses and mechanical damping. Whereas for the on-off detection, moderate Bell violation is found in the steady state and robust against cavity losses and mechanical damping. Although Bell violation with the parity detection seems extremely challenging to be experimentally demonstrated, the conditions required for violating Bell inequalities with the on-off detection are much less demanding.