Challenges
Datasets
Workspaces
Papers
Discussions
Leaderboard
Log inSign up
Challenges
Datasets
Workspaces
Papers
Discussions
Leaderboard
Blog
Job Board
Q3AS

© 2026 Aqora Quantum S.A.S.

TermsPrivacyLegal Notice

arXiv:2607.19872

Nonreciprocal phonon blockade in spin quadratic optomechanical systems

Yao Dong, Guo-Feng Zhang

quant-phSubmitted Jul 22, 2026• Announced Jul 23, 2026
arXivHTMLPDF

Abstract

We propose a scheme for achieving nonreciprocal phonon blockade in a quadratic optomechanical (QOM) system consisting of two spinning resonators near-field coupled to a nanomechanical oscillator. Due to the Sagnac-Fizeau effect, pump fields propagating in opposite directions experience distinct effective detunings,thereby leading to asymmetric intracavity intensities. Through the optical spring effect, this intensity imbalance gives rise to direction-dependent shifts in the effective mechanical frequency, providing the core mechanism for nonreciprocal phonon blockade. By judiciously setting parameters, single-phonon resonant excitation leads to conventional phonon blockade for one pump direction, whereas two-phonon resonance facilitates phononinduced tunneling (PIT) for the other. The pronounced nonreciprocity is quantified by a contrast ratio in the phonon second-order correlation function exceeding 55 dB. To elucidate the nonreciprocal statistics, the phonon blockade is further analyzed in terms of interference between the coherent component and squeezed fluctuations. Incorporating thermal phonons, we reveal an extended nonreciprocal thermal effect, where increasing thermal noise degrades antibunching toward Poissonian statistics in one direction, yet reverses the statistics from bunching to antibunching in the opposite direction. Our work provides a pathway toward nonreciprocal phonon devices and directional phonon switches, with potential applications in chiral networks and phononic information processing.

Journal reference
Physical Review A 114, 013701 (2026)
Comments
13 pages, 6 figures

Related papers

Optical noise-resistant nonreciprocal phonon blockade in a spinning optomechanical resonator

Ning Yuan, Shuang He, Shiyan Li +2 more

A scheme of nonreciprocal conventional phonon blockade (PB) is proposed in a spinning optomechanical resonator coupled with a two-level atom. The coherent coupling between the atom and breathing mode is mediated by the optical mode with a large detuning. Due to the Fizeau shift caused by the spinning resonator, the PB can be implemented in a nonreciprocal way. Specifically, when the spinning resonator is driven from one direction, the single-phonon (1PB) and two-phonon blockade (2PB) can be achieved by adjusting both the amplitude and frequency of the mechanical drive field, while phonon-induced tunneling (PIT) occurs when the spinning resonator is driven from the opposite direction. The PB effects are insensitive to cavity decay because of the adiabatic elimination of the optical mode, thus making the scheme more robust to the optical noise and still feasible even in a low-Q cavity. Our scheme provides a flexible method for engineering a unidirectional phonon source with external control, which is expected to be used as a chiral quantum device in quantum computing networks.

Optics Express•May 25, 2023•15 citations

Two-Phonon Blockade in Quadratically Coupled Optomechanical Systems

Zi-Yuan Li, Guangri Jin, Tai-Shuang Yin +1 more

We propose a scheme to realize the two-phonon blockade effect in a quadratically coupled optomechanical system. We consider the case that the optical cavity is simultaneously driven by a strong pumping field and a weak driving field. By strongly driving the optical cavity, the nonlinear interaction between the optical mode and the mechanical resonator can be significantly enhanced and an effective second-order nonlinearity between photons and phonons is induced. Based on this effectively strong nonlinearity, the two-phonon blockade effect can be achieved when a weak driving field is applied into the optical cavity. By contrast, we study the case of weakly driving the mechanical resonator. In this case, the single-phonon blockade is generated, while the two-phonon blockade cannot be observed. By numerically calculating the second-order and third-order correlation function, we investigate the statistical characteristics of phonons. In addition, we also study the influence of the thermal noise on the achieved two-phonon blockade effect. Our work provides an alternative approach for implementing multiphonon blockade and has potential applications in quantum information processing.

Photonics•Jan 27, 2022•9 citations

Nonreciprocal mechanical entanglement in a spinning optomechanical system

Shan-Shan 珊珊 Chen 陈, Jing-Jing 京京 Zhang 张, J. -C. Li +3 more

Abstract Quantum entanglement between distant massive mechanical oscillators is an important resource in sensitive measurements and quantum information processing. We achieve the nonreciprocal mechanical entanglement in a compound optomechanical device consisting of two mechanical oscillators and a spinning whispering-gallery mode (WGM) optical microresonator. It is found that obvious nonreciprocal mechanical entanglement emerges in this system in the presence of the Sagnac effect which is induced by the rotation of the WGM resonator, and the nonreciprocal region can be controlled by tuning the angular velocity of the rotation. The nonreciprocity originates from the breaking of the time-reversal symmetry of this multimode system due to the presence of the Sagnac effect. The optomechanical coupling and the mechanical interaction provide cooling channels for the first and second mechanical oscillators, respectively. Two mechanical oscillators can be cooled simultaneously. The simultaneous cooling and the mechanical coupling of two mechanical oscillators ensure the generation of mechanical entanglement. Furthermore, an optimal mechanical entanglement can be achieved when the moderate optical frequency detuning and the driving power are chosen. The thermal noise of the mechanical environment has a negative effect on mechanical entanglement. Our scheme provides promising opportunities for research of quantum information processing based on phonons and sensitive measurements.

Chinese Physics B•Aug 23, 2024•2 citations

Phonon Blockade in a Hybrid Quadratically Coupled Optomechanical System

Haoxian Li, Weici Liu, Zhongchao Wei +7 more

Abstract Phonon statistics in a hybrid optomechanical system, where a mechanical resonator is quadratically coupled to a cavity and couples with another resonator via Coulomb interaction is studied. It is found that the conventional and unconventional phonon blockade can be both achieved at the same parameter regime, which is confirmed by analytical and numerical results. By analyzing the energy level structure, it is found that the anharmonicity of the system is the joint action of both the Coulomb interaction and the optomechanical coupling, where the nonlinearity introduced by the latter has a more significant effect on one branch of the conventional phonon blockade. In addition, the phonon blockade can be enhanced by introducing the mechanical parametric amplifier with optimal parameters, where the physical mechanism underlying comes from the multi‐pathway destructive interference. It is found that the phonon blockade is fragile toward thermal noise due to the weak quantum interference, which can be overcome by increasing the driving strength and applying the mechanical parametric amplifier with suitable parameters. This work may provide a way to manipulate the phonon blockade and can be helpful to the application of quantum information processing.

Advanced Quantum Technologies•Apr 21, 2024•2 citations

Nonreciprocal unconventional magnon blockade via the Sagnac-Fizeau shift in an optomagnonic system

Xu Deng, Kaikai Zhang, Tao Shui +1 more

We propose a scheme to achieve nonreciprocal unconventional magnon blockade (NUMB) in an optomagnonic system composed of a spinning resonator with ${\ensuremath{\chi}}^{(2)}$ nonlinearity and one yttrium iron garnet sphere. When two-photon driving is input from different ends of the resonator, complete quantum destructive interference appears and disappears between different paths for two-magnon excitation due to the opposite Sagnac-Fizeau shifts induced by Fizeau drag, which is the physical origin for achieving NUMB. To intuitively understand the nonreciprocal phenomenon, the analytical solution of the equal-time second-order correlation function is approximately given through the Schr\"odinger equation and compared with the full numerical solution obtained from the Lindblad master equation. From the two almost identical solutions, we show that a giant NUMB can be observed in the absence of probe detuning. We also show that a switchable NUMB can be achieved by tuning the relative phase between the external laser fields. In addition, increasing the amplitude of the probe field appropriately can reduce the impact of ambient thermal noise on NUMB. Our work may have potential applications in the design of nonreciprocal single-magnon devices.

Physical Review A•Dec 16, 2024•17 citations

Phonon blockade in a quadratically coupled optomechanical system with two-phonon driving

Yue Wei, Biao Xiong, Chuan-Jia Shan +2 more

We propose a scheme to enhance phonon blockade effect in a quadratically coupled optomechanical system. By applying a degenerate parametric drive to the mechanical oscillator, we introduce a mechanical parametric amplifier (MPA) to the system. We show that the phonon blockade can be achieved in both the single-phonon resonant regime and multipath interference regime due to the optomechanical nonlinearity and MPA. By combining the two regimes together, we show that the phonon blockade effect is enhanced compared to the regime without MPA. What is more, the two-time second-order correlation function gradually tends to one without rapid oscillations in our scheme, which suggests that high time resolution is not necessary in the detection.

Results in Physics•Dec 30, 2022•13 citations
We propose a scheme for achieving nonreciprocal phonon blockade in a quadratic optomechanical (QOM) system consisting of two spinning resonators near-field coupled to a nanomechanical oscillator. Due to the Sagnac-Fizeau effect, pump fields propagating in opposite directions experience distinct effective detunings,thereby leading to asymmetric intracavity intensities. Through the optical spring effect, this intensity imbalance gives rise to direction-dependent shifts in the effective mechanical frequency, providing the core mechanism for nonreciprocal phonon blockade. By judiciously setting parameters, single-phonon resonant excitation leads to conventional phonon blockade for one pump direction, whereas two-phonon resonance facilitates phononinduced tunneling (PIT) for the other. The pronounced nonreciprocity is quantified by a contrast ratio in the phonon second-order correlation function exceeding 55 dB. To elucidate the nonreciprocal statistics, the phonon blockade is further analyzed in terms of interference between the coherent component and squeezed fluctuations. Incorporating thermal phonons, we reveal an extended nonreciprocal thermal effect, where increasing thermal noise degrades antibunching toward Poissonian statistics in one direction, yet reverses the statistics from bunching to antibunching in the opposite direction. Our work provides a pathway toward nonreciprocal phonon devices and directional phonon switches, with potential applications in chiral networks and phononic information processing.
A scheme of nonreciprocal conventional phonon blockade (PB) is proposed in a spinning optomechanical resonator coupled with a two-level atom. The coherent coupling between the atom and breathing mode is mediated by the optical mode with a large detuning. Due to the Fizeau shift caused by the spinning resonator, the PB can be implemented in a nonreciprocal way. Specifically, when the spinning resonator is driven from one direction, the single-phonon (1PB) and two-phonon blockade (2PB) can be achieved by adjusting both the amplitude and frequency of the mechanical drive field, while phonon-induced tunneling (PIT) occurs when the spinning resonator is driven from the opposite direction. The PB effects are insensitive to cavity decay because of the adiabatic elimination of the optical mode, thus making the scheme more robust to the optical noise and still feasible even in a low-Q cavity. Our scheme provides a flexible method for engineering a unidirectional phonon source with external control, which is expected to be used as a chiral quantum device in quantum computing networks.
We propose a scheme to realize the two-phonon blockade effect in a quadratically coupled optomechanical system. We consider the case that the optical cavity is simultaneously driven by a strong pumping field and a weak driving field. By strongly driving the optical cavity, the nonlinear interaction between the optical mode and the mechanical resonator can be significantly enhanced and an effective second-order nonlinearity between photons and phonons is induced. Based on this effectively strong nonlinearity, the two-phonon blockade effect can be achieved when a weak driving field is applied into the optical cavity. By contrast, we study the case of weakly driving the mechanical resonator. In this case, the single-phonon blockade is generated, while the two-phonon blockade cannot be observed. By numerically calculating the second-order and third-order correlation function, we investigate the statistical characteristics of phonons. In addition, we also study the influence of the thermal noise on the achieved two-phonon blockade effect. Our work provides an alternative approach for implementing multiphonon blockade and has potential applications in quantum information processing.
Abstract Quantum entanglement between distant massive mechanical oscillators is an important resource in sensitive measurements and quantum information processing. We achieve the nonreciprocal mechanical entanglement in a compound optomechanical device consisting of two mechanical oscillators and a spinning whispering-gallery mode (WGM) optical microresonator. It is found that obvious nonreciprocal mechanical entanglement emerges in this system in the presence of the Sagnac effect which is induced by the rotation of the WGM resonator, and the nonreciprocal region can be controlled by tuning the angular velocity of the rotation. The nonreciprocity originates from the breaking of the time-reversal symmetry of this multimode system due to the presence of the Sagnac effect. The optomechanical coupling and the mechanical interaction provide cooling channels for the first and second mechanical oscillators, respectively. Two mechanical oscillators can be cooled simultaneously. The simultaneous cooling and the mechanical coupling of two mechanical oscillators ensure the generation of mechanical entanglement. Furthermore, an optimal mechanical entanglement can be achieved when the moderate optical frequency detuning and the driving power are chosen. The thermal noise of the mechanical environment has a negative effect on mechanical entanglement. Our scheme provides promising opportunities for research of quantum information processing based on phonons and sensitive measurements.
Abstract Phonon statistics in a hybrid optomechanical system, where a mechanical resonator is quadratically coupled to a cavity and couples with another resonator via Coulomb interaction is studied. It is found that the conventional and unconventional phonon blockade can be both achieved at the same parameter regime, which is confirmed by analytical and numerical results. By analyzing the energy level structure, it is found that the anharmonicity of the system is the joint action of both the Coulomb interaction and the optomechanical coupling, where the nonlinearity introduced by the latter has a more significant effect on one branch of the conventional phonon blockade. In addition, the phonon blockade can be enhanced by introducing the mechanical parametric amplifier with optimal parameters, where the physical mechanism underlying comes from the multi‐pathway destructive interference. It is found that the phonon blockade is fragile toward thermal noise due to the weak quantum interference, which can be overcome by increasing the driving strength and applying the mechanical parametric amplifier with suitable parameters. This work may provide a way to manipulate the phonon blockade and can be helpful to the application of quantum information processing.
We propose a scheme to achieve nonreciprocal unconventional magnon blockade (NUMB) in an optomagnonic system composed of a spinning resonator with ${\ensuremath{\chi}}^{(2)}$ nonlinearity and one yttrium iron garnet sphere. When two-photon driving is input from different ends of the resonator, complete quantum destructive interference appears and disappears between different paths for two-magnon excitation due to the opposite Sagnac-Fizeau shifts induced by Fizeau drag, which is the physical origin for achieving NUMB. To intuitively understand the nonreciprocal phenomenon, the analytical solution of the equal-time second-order correlation function is approximately given through the Schr\"odinger equation and compared with the full numerical solution obtained from the Lindblad master equation. From the two almost identical solutions, we show that a giant NUMB can be observed in the absence of probe detuning. We also show that a switchable NUMB can be achieved by tuning the relative phase between the external laser fields. In addition, increasing the amplitude of the probe field appropriately can reduce the impact of ambient thermal noise on NUMB. Our work may have potential applications in the design of nonreciprocal single-magnon devices.
We propose a scheme to enhance phonon blockade effect in a quadratically coupled optomechanical system. By applying a degenerate parametric drive to the mechanical oscillator, we introduce a mechanical parametric amplifier (MPA) to the system. We show that the phonon blockade can be achieved in both the single-phonon resonant regime and multipath interference regime due to the optomechanical nonlinearity and MPA. By combining the two regimes together, we show that the phonon blockade effect is enhanced compared to the regime without MPA. What is more, the two-time second-order correlation function gradually tends to one without rapid oscillations in our scheme, which suggests that high time resolution is not necessary in the detection.