Uncooled low-noise optomechanical sensors on thin-film lithium niobate
Abstract
Optomechanical transduction harnesses the interaction between optical fields and mechanical motion to achieve sensitive measurement of weak mechanical quantities with inherently low noise. Lithium niobate combines low optical loss, strong piezoelectricity, a high intrinsic f × Q m factor, and low thermal conductivity, making it promising for exploring optomechanical platforms targeting thermal sensing applications. Here, we demonstrate an integrated optomechanical platform on thin-film lithium niobate with precisely engineered optical, mechanical, and thermal fields within a compact 40 μm-diameter footprint. The platform integrates suspended microring resonators with ultrathin central membranes, reducing effective mass and thermal capacitance while maintaining a high intrinsic optical quality factor Q o of 10 ⁶ and a mechanical quality factor Q m of 1117, which increases to 5.1 × 10 ⁴ upon optomechanical oscillation. The two-step etching suppresses thermal dissipation into the silicon substrate and enhances thermal sensitivity, achieving a temperature coefficient of frequency of −124 ppm K ⁻¹ , a measurable loaded thermal response time of 7.2 μs, and a noise-equivalent power of 6.2 nW Hz −1/2 at 10 kHz and room temperature. This compact and scalable platform opens new opportunities for high-sensitivity thermal sensing and power detection and supports heterogeneous integration with infrared absorbers for uncooled infrared detection, thereby paving the way toward large-format infrared sensing arrays with low-noise, all-optical readout.
Related
- Noise suppression of quantum frequency conversion in thin-film lithium niobate waveguides via adapted poling
- All-optical erasing of photorefractive solitonic X-Junctions in lithium niobate thin-film on insulator
- High-speed, compact and low-crosstalk lithium niobate on insulator 2 × 2 optical switch for on-chip integration
- Elastic constants of congruent and nearly stoichiometric lithium niobate crystals by Brillouin light scattering up to 800 °C
- Recent advances in poled lithium niobate
BibTeX
@article{yu2026uncooled,
title = {{Uncooled low-noise optomechanical sensors on thin-film lithium niobate}},
author = {Yue Yu and Ran Yin and Ian Anderson and Yinan Wang and Jack Kramer and Ian Christen and Chun-Ho Lee and Xinyi Ren and Zaijun Chen and Michelle L. Povinelli and Daniel Wasserman and Ruochen Lu and Mengjie Yu},
journal = {Light: Science \& Applications},
year = {2026},
month = oct,
doi = {10.1038/s41377-026-02506-z},
url = {https://www.nature.com/articles/s41377-026-02506-z},
note = {CC BY 4.0},
}
RIS
TY - JOUR
TI - Uncooled low-noise optomechanical sensors on thin-film lithium niobate
AU - Yue Yu
AU - Ran Yin
AU - Ian Anderson
AU - Yinan Wang
AU - Jack Kramer
AU - Ian Christen
AU - Chun-Ho Lee
AU - Xinyi Ren
AU - Zaijun Chen
AU - Michelle L. Povinelli
AU - Daniel Wasserman
AU - Ruochen Lu
AU - Mengjie Yu
PY - 2026
DA - 2026/10/20
JO - Light: Science & Applications
DO - 10.1038/s41377-026-02506-z
UR - https://www.nature.com/articles/s41377-026-02506-z
AB - Optomechanical transduction harnesses the interaction between optical fields and mechanical motion to achieve sensitive measurement of weak mechanical quantities with inherently low noise. Lithium niobate combines low optical loss, strong piezoelectricity, a high intrinsic f × Q m factor, and low thermal conductivity, making it promising for exploring optomechanical platforms targeting thermal sensing applications. Here, we demonstrate an integrated optomechanical platform on thin-film lithium niobate with precisely engineered optical, mechanical, and thermal fields within a compact 40 μm-diameter footprint. The platform integrates suspended microring resonators with ultrathin central membranes, reducing effective mass and thermal capacitance while maintaining a high intrinsic optical quality factor Q o of 10 ⁶ and a mechanical quality factor Q m of 1117, which increases to 5.1 × 10 ⁴ upon optomechanical oscillation. The two-step etching suppresses thermal dissipation into the silicon substrate and enhances thermal sensitivity, achieving a temperature coefficient of frequency of −124 ppm K ⁻¹ , a measurable loaded thermal response time of 7.2 μs, and a noise-equivalent power of 6.2 nW Hz −1/2 at 10 kHz and room temperature. This compact and scalable platform opens new opportunities for high-sensitivity thermal sensing and power detection and supports heterogeneous integration with infrared absorbers for uncooled infrared detection, thereby paving the way toward large-format infrared sensing arrays with low-noise, all-optical readout.
SN - 2047-7538
SN - 2095-5545
ER -