Single-Mode Ring Resonator-Based Optomechanical Transducers for Advanced Atomic Force Sensing

26 March 2025, Version 1
This content is a preprint and has not undergone peer review at the time of posting.

Abstract

Atomic force microscopy (AFM) is a widely used technique for high-resolution imaging and force sensing, yet its performance is fundamentally constrained by the cantilever size, spring constants, and mechanical frequencies. To overcome these limitations, we present a compact and highly efficient single-mode ring resonator-based optomechanical transducer on a silicon-on-insulator (SOI) platform. Unlike conventional designs that rely on whispering gallery modes (WGMs) resonators, our approach ensures mode stability, facilitates straightforward signal interpretation, and enhances measurement reliability by eliminating mode-splitting effects and complex optical responses. Coupled with a picogram-scale cantilever, our system achieves exceptional displacement sensitivity of 6.7 × 10^(-16) m/Hz^(1/2)Hz and force detection down to 5.0 × 10^(-14) N, providing a high performance alternative to existing optomechanical AFM transducers. The tunable mechanical resonance frequency (1.3 MHz to 22.5 MHz) and adjustable stiffness (0.46 N/m to 3.54 N/m) enable precise force sensing across a broad range of applications, from soft matter characterization to high-speed imaging. Importantly, our results exhibit strong agreement with theoretical predictions, ensuring accurate and direct displacement measurements. This is a key advantage over WGM-based approaches that suffer from optical mode instability. Our results establish this single-mode optomechanical transducer as a robust, high-sensitivity platform for next-generation AFM and nanoscale sensing applications, offering a compact, cost-effective, and highly precise alternative to traditional free-space optical detection methods. The combination of high displacement sensitivity, mode stability, and tunable performance establishes this optomechanical transducer as a promising advancement in integrated nanoscale sensing and AFM applications.

Keywords

Cavity optomechanics
nanophotonic transducer
ring resonator
AFM

Supplementary materials

Title
Description
Actions
Title
SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION
Description
A PDF file including of additional figures S1 to S4 and table S1.
Actions

Comments

Comments are not moderated before they are posted, but they can be removed by the site moderators if they are found to be in contravention of our Commenting Policy [opens in a new tab] - please read this policy before you post. Comments should be used for scholarly discussion of the content in question. You can find more information about how to use the commenting feature here [opens in a new tab] .
This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy [opens in a new tab] and Terms of Service [opens in a new tab] apply.