Efficient microwave frequency conversion mediated by the vibrational motion of a silicon nitride nanobeam oscillator

TL;DR

This paper demonstrates an efficient on-chip microwave frequency converter using a silicon nitride nanobeam oscillator, enabling bidirectional quantum state transfer with high efficiency and bandwidth, suitable for integrated quantum communication.

Contribution

It introduces a silicon nitride-based electro-opto-mechanical transducer capable of efficient, bidirectional microwave frequency conversion with high fidelity, reconfigurability, and compatibility with photonic crystal cavities.

Findings

Achieved up to 60% conversion efficiency.

Demonstrated a bandwidth of 1.7 kHz.

Bidirectional coherent frequency conversion with high dynamic range.

Abstract

Microelectromechanical systems and integrated photonics provide the basis for many reliable and compact circuit elements in modern communication systems. Electro-opto-mechanical devices are currently one of the leading approaches to realize ultra-sensitive, low-loss transducers for an emerging quantum information technology. Here we present an on-chip microwave frequency converter based on a planar aluminum on silicon nitride platform that is compatible with slot-mode coupled photonic crystal cavities. We show efficient frequency conversion between two propagating microwave modes mediated by the radiation pressure interaction with a metalized dielectric nanobeam oscillator. We achieve bidirectional coherent conversion with a total device efficiency of up to ~ 60 %, a dynamic range of $2\times10^9$ photons/s and an instantaneous bandwidth of up to 1.7 kHz. A high fidelity quantum state transfer would be possible if the drive dependent output noise of currently $\sim14$ photons$\ \cdot\ $s$^{-1}\ \cdot\ $Hz$^{-1}$ is further reduced. Such a silicon nitride based transducer is in-situ reconfigurable and could be used for on-chip classical and quantum signal routing and filtering, both for microwave and hybrid microwave-optical applications.