Editing Laser cooling (section)

==== Mechanical systems ====
Starting in the 2000s, laser cooling was applied to [[Cavity optomechanics|small mechanical systems]], ranging from small cantilevers to the mirrors used in the [[LIGO]] observatory.  These devices are connected to a larger substrate, such as a mechanical membrane attached to a frame, or they are held in optical traps, in both cases the mechanical system is a harmonic oscillator.  Laser cooling reduces the random vibrations of the mechanical oscillator, removing thermal phonons from the system.

In 2007, an MIT team successfully laser-cooled a macro-scale (1&nbsp;gram) object to 0.8&nbsp;K.<ref>{{cite news |title=Laser-cooling Brings Large Object Near Absolute Zero |url=https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/04/070406171036.htm |work=ScienceDaily }}</ref> In 2011, a team from the California Institute of Technology and the University of Vienna became the first to laser-cool a (10&nbsp;μm × 1&nbsp;μm) mechanical object to its quantum ground state.<ref>{{cite web |url=https://www.caltech.edu/about/news/caltech-team-uses-laser-light-cool-object-quantum-ground-state-1726|title =Caltech Team Uses Laser Light to Cool Object to Quantum Ground State|website =Caltech.edu|access-date= June 27, 2013|date= 5 October 2011}}</ref>