Caltech researchers have created a nanoscale crystal device that allows them to confine both light and sound vibrations in the same tiny space.
The interactions between sound and light in this optomechanical crysta can result in mechanical vibrations with frequencies as high as tens of gigahertz, or 10 billion cycles per second. Being able to achieve such frequencies gives these devices the ability to send large amounts of information, and opens up a wide array of potential applications—everything from lightwave communication systems to biosensors capable of detecting (or weighing) a single macromolecule.