Probing Bogoliubov quasiparticles in superfluid ${}^3$He with a 'vibrating-wire like' MEMS device

Abstract

We have measured the interaction between superfluid ${}^3$He-B and a micro-machined goalpost-shaped device at temperatures below $0.2T_c$. The measured damping follows well the theory developed for vibrating wires, in which the Andreev reflection of quasiparticles in the flow field around the moving structure leads to a nonlinear frictional force. At low velocities the damping force is proportional to velocity while it tends to saturate for larger excitations. Above a velocity of 2.6mms${}^{-1}$ the damping abruptly increases, which is interpreted in terms of Cooper-pair breaking. Interestingly, this critical velocity is significantly lower than reported with other mechanical probes immersed in superfluid ${}^3$He. Furthermore, we report on a nonlinear resonance shape for large motion amplitudes that we interpret as an inertial effect due to quasiparticle friction, but other mechanisms could possibly be invoked as well.

arXiv commentJ. of Low Temp. Phys. in press

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Cited by in corpus (10)

• Mesoscopic physics of nanomechanical systems
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• Critical Velocity in the Presence of Surface Bound States in Superfluid ${}^3$He-B
• Operating Nanobeams in a Quantum Fluid
• Nanomechanical resonators for cryogenic research
• Phonon coupling between a nanomechanical resonator and a quantum fluid
• Dimensional control of tunneling two level systems in nanoelectromechanical resonators
• Superfluid ${}^4$He as a rigorous test bench for different damping models in nanoelectromechanical resonators
• Fully suspended nano-beams for quantum fluids
• Contribution of Andreev reflection to the mobility of surface state electrons on superfluid ${}^3$He-B