Visible and ultraviolet laser light has been used for years to
cool trapped atoms—and more recently larger objects—by reducing
the extent of their thermal motion. Now, applying a different
form of radiation for a similar purpose, physicists at the
National Institute of Standards and Technology have used radio
waves to dampen the motion of a miniature mechanical oscillator
containing more than a quadrillion atoms, a cooling technique
that may open a new window into the quantum world using smaller
and simpler equipment. Described in a forthcoming issue of
Physical Review Letters, this demonstration of radio-frequency
(RF) cooling of a relatively large object may offer a new tool
for exploring the elusive boundary where the familiar rules of
the everyday, macroscale world give way to the bizarre quantum
behavior seen in the smallest particles of matter and light.
There may be technology applications as well: the RF circuit
could be made small enough to be incorporated on a chip with
tiny oscillators, a focus of