Artist impression of new nanostrings that can vibrate for a very long time. These nanostrings vibrate more than 100,000 times per second. Because it’s difficult for energy to leak out, it also means environmental noise is hard to get in, making these some of the best sensors for room temperature environments. Credit: Richard Norte
This innovation is pivotal for studying macroscopic quantum phenomena at room temperature—environments where such phenomena were previously masked by noise. While the weird laws of quantum mechanics are usually only seen in single atoms, the nanostrings’ ability to isolate themselves from our everyday heat-based vibrational noise allows them to open a window into their own quantum signatures; strings made from billions of atoms.
The nanostrings are crafted using advanced nanotechnology techniques developed at the TU Delft, pushing the boundaries of how thin and long suspended nanostructures can be made. A key of the collaboration is that these nanostructures can be made so perfectly on a microchip, that there is an extraordinary match between simulations and experiments – meaning that simulations can act as the data for machine learning algorithms, rather than costly experiments.