Coupling mechanical resonators and emitters

In our latest arXiv submission, we propose a new mechanism to create a coherent coupling between a macroscopic mechanical resonator to a two-level quantum emitter. The idea relies on a principle we term mode field coupling: mechanical deformation directly affects the Rabi rate with which an emitter couples to a cavity. This effect allows the emitter to emit phonons instead of photons, and can be surprisingly strong. This research is a direct collaboration with Michele Cotrufo and Andrea Fiore at TUE.