Heterodyne position detection of an optomechanical system

Abstract

We report a heterodyne detection scheme for position readout of an optomechanical system, in particular an optically levitated particle, implemented via digital In-phase and Quadrature demodulation on a field-programmable gate array. Compared to the standard homodyne approach, the proposed method offers three key advantages: it remains robust in the presence of strong parasitic back-reflected fields that would otherwise prevent stable phase locking; it produces a signal linearly proportional to the particle displacement, eliminating phase-wrapping distortion; and its calibration factor is intrinsically immune to drifts in the optical power of the local oscillator or scattered field. We experimentally demonstrate and quantify all three advantages through simultaneous homodyne and heterodyne measurements on the same trapped particle. The proposed method can be used in any optomechanical system based on phase readout.