Regensburg 2000 – scientific programme

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PV: Plenarvorträge

PV VII

PV VII: Plenary Talk

Friday, March 31, 2000, 08:30–09:30, H1

Nanomechanical Systems: Physics, Applications, and Ultimate Limits for Small Moving Devices — •Michael Roukes — Professor of Physics, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA USA

Microelectronics technology is now pushing deep into the submicron regime, yet, for the most part, work on micromachines still remains back at the few micron scale or larger. The time is ripe to put the pieces together and to embark upon a concerted exploration of nanomechanical devices. I will highlight the promise of this domain, and our recent work in this field. Our efforts have culminated in nanomechanical devices with promise for unique new applications in electronics and metrology. These include the first VHF (very high frequency) mechanical resonators, the development of mechanical electrometers yielding sensitivity below a single electron charge, applications of suspended nanostructures to mesoscopic thermal transport (which enabled our recent observation of the quantum of thermal conductance), and the force-detected magnetic resonance imaging. Ultimately nanomechanical systems will permit access to a mesoscopic regime where mechanics becomes dominated by quantum, rather than thermal, fluctuations; where force and displacement detection meets, or even exceeds, the standard quantum limit; and where observation of heat flow involving individual phonons becomes feasible. I will discuss the challenges we face as we proceed along this path.