Cooling a micromechanical resonator by quantum back-action from a noisy qubit

Abstract

We study the role of qubit dephasing in cooling a mechanical resonator by quantum back-action. With a superconducting flux qubit as a specific example, we show that ground-state cooling of a mechanical resonator can only be realized if the qubit dephasing rate is sufficiently low. © 2009 The American Physical Society.