Optical trapping of the transversal motion for an optically levitated mirror

Abstract

Optomechanical systems are suitable for elucidating quantum phenomena at the macroscopic scale in the sense of the mass scale. The systems should be well-isolated from the environment to avoid classical noises, which conceal quantum signals. Optical levitation is a promising way to isolate optomechanical systems from the environment. To realize optical levitation, all degrees of freedom need to be trapped. Until now, longitudinal trapping and rotational trapping of a mirror with optical radiation pressure have been studied in detail and validated with various experiments. However, less attention has been paid to the transversal trapping of a mirror. Herein, we report a pioneering result where we experimentally confirmed transversal trapping of a mirror of a Fabry-P\'erot cavity using a torsional pendulum. Through this demonstration, we experimentally proved that optical levitation is realizable with only two Fabry-P\'erot cavities that are aligned vertically. This work paves the way toward optical levitation and realizing a macroscopic quantum system.