Cavity optomechanics on a microfluidic resonator with water and viscous liquids

Scientists in the USA have successfully used optomechanics to probe a microfluidic system. Kyu Hyun Kim and co-workers at the University of Michigan and the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign fabricated a bulbous hollow-glass capillary and filled it with sugar-water solution. They then used a tapered optical fibre to couple light evanescently in the perimeter of the capillary and thus excite optical whispering gallery modes. This optical mode excites a vibrational mode of the liquid-filled glass structure via the centrifugal radiation pressure that light applies while circumferentially circulating, which in turn modulated the light at a particular frequency. The frequency of the induced vibrations varied with the sugar concentration of the liquid, thus indicating the potential of the structure to function as a sensor. The researchers found that input optical powers as small as 1 mW were sufficient to induce vibrations.

[1]  Tal Carmon,et al.  Modal spectroscopy of optoexcited vibrations of a micron-scale on-chip resonator at greater than 1 GHz frequency. , 2007, Physical review letters.

[2]  S. Arnold,et al.  Whispering-gallery-mode biosensing: label-free detection down to single molecules , 2008, Nature Methods.

[3]  K. Vahala,et al.  A picogram- and nanometre-scale photonic-crystal optomechanical cavity , 2008, Nature.

[4]  Pablo Juliano,et al.  ENGINEERING PROPERTIES OF FOODS , 2007 .

[5]  Ofer Shapira,et al.  Microfluidic directional emission control of an azimuthally polarized radial fibre laser , 2012, Nature Photonics.

[6]  Hongying Zhu,et al.  Rapid and label-free detection of breast cancer biomarker CA15-3 in clinical human serum samples with optofluidic ring resonator sensors. , 2009, Analytical chemistry.

[7]  S. Berneschi,et al.  High Q silica microbubble resonators fabricated by arc discharge. , 2011, Optics letters.

[8]  Jonathan Ward,et al.  Single-input spherical microbubble resonator. , 2011, Optics letters.

[9]  D. W. Allan,et al.  Statistics of atomic frequency standards , 1966 .

[10]  Tal Carmon,et al.  Temporal behavior of radiation-pressure-induced vibrations of an optical microcavity phonon mode. , 2005, Physical review letters.

[11]  Wonsuk Lee,et al.  A quasi-droplet optofluidic ring resonator laser using a micro-bubble , 2011 .

[12]  Scott S. Verbridge,et al.  Fabrication of a nanomechanical mass sensor containing a nanofluidic channel. , 2010, Nano letters.

[13]  A. Shkel,et al.  Glass Blowing on a Wafer Level , 2007, Journal of Microelectromechanical Systems.

[14]  Tal Carmon,et al.  Photonic micro-electromechanical systems vibrating at X-band (11-GHz) rates. , 2009, Physical review letters.

[15]  Cai,et al.  Observation of critical coupling in a fiber taper to a silica-microsphere whispering-gallery mode system , 2000, Physical review letters.

[16]  K. Vahala,et al.  High sensitivity nanoparticle detection using optical microcavities , 2011, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

[17]  H. Craighead,et al.  Single cell detection with micromechanical oscillators , 2001 .

[18]  A. E. Baroudi,et al.  Study of a spherical head model. Analytical and numerical solutions in fluid–structure interaction approach , 2012 .

[19]  S. Ozdemir,et al.  Detecting single viruses and nanoparticles using whispering gallery microlasers. , 2011, Nature nanotechnology.

[20]  Tal Carmon,et al.  Stimulated optomechanical excitation of surface acoustic waves in a microdevice. , 2011, Nature communications.

[21]  Chi Xiong,et al.  GHz optomechanical resonators with high mechanical Q factor in air. , 2011, Optics express.

[22]  Jonathan M. Ward,et al.  Single input Spherical Microbubble Resonator , 2011 .

[23]  S. Manalis,et al.  Weighing of biomolecules, single cells and single nanoparticles in fluid , 2007, Nature.

[24]  D. Psaltis,et al.  Developing optofluidic technology through the fusion of microfluidics and optics , 2006, Nature.

[25]  R. Windeler,et al.  Optical microbubble resonator. , 2010, Optics letters.