Millen, James

Neuromorphic detection and control of arrays of microparticles

James Millen - Department of Physics, Faculty of Natural and Mathematical Sciences, King’s College London, England

Abstract: Microparticles levitated in a vacuum can be used as precision sensors and for probing fundamental physics. It is an exciting extension to utilize arrays of levitated microparticles, to enhance detection via sensor-fusion, to allow directional detection of forces, and to engineer complex collective states - even potentially in the quantum regime. It is challenging to detect the motion of arrays of objects, and even more so to read-out their motion in real-time. We use a novel detection technique to achieve this: neuromorphic, or event-based, imaging (EBI) [1]. EBI enables us to detect 10s of particles and read-out their motion at 1 MHz. We present two applications of this technology: firstly we detect and cool arrays of interacting particles [2], secondly we track a single particle with high dynamic range and resolution for studies of fundamental thermodynamics [3].

[1] Ren et al., Appl. Phys. Letts. 121, 113506 (2022)
[2] Ren et al., arXiv:2408.00661 (2024)
[3] Message et al., arXiv:2501.03677 (2025)