Wide QRS complex tachycardia due to typical atrial flutter with accessory pathway conduction.

A 62-year-old male patient was admitted with regular wide QRS complex tachycardia. After ajmaline administration, the heart rate slowed down disclosing atrial flutter with variable QRS morphologies. Electrocardiography after conversion to sinus rhythm showed narrow QRS complexes. Decremental atrial stimulation during electrophysiological study caused progressive pre-excitation. Spontaneously, typical atrial flutter occurred with pre-excited QRS complexes. Both accessory pathway and atrial flutter were ablated in the same session.

Optical racetrack resonator transduction of nanomechanical cantilevers.

Optomechanical transduction has demonstrated its supremacy in probing nanomechanical displacements. In order to apply nano-optomechanical systems (NOMS) as force and mass sensors, knowledge about the transduction responsivity (i.e. the change in measured optical transmission with nanomechanical displacement) and its tradeoffs with system design is paramount. We compare the measured responsivities of NOMS devices with varying length, optomechanical coupling strength gom, and optical cavity properties. Cantilever beams 1.5 to 5 µm long are fabricated 70 to 160 nm from a racetrack resonator optical cavity and their thermomechanical (TM) noise signals are measured. We derive a generic expression for the transduction responsivity of the NOMS in terms of optical and mechanical system parameters such as finesse, optomechanical coupling constant, and interaction length. The form of the expression holds direct insight as to how these parameters affect the responsivity. With this expression, we obtain the optomechanical coupling constants using only measurements of the TM noise power spectra and optical cavity transmission slopes. All optical pump/probe operation is also demonstrated in our side-coupled cantilever-racetrack NOMS. Finally, to assess potential operation in a gas sensing environment, the TM noise signal of a device is measured at atmospheric pressure.

Time-domain control of ultrahigh-frequency nanomechanical systems.

Nanoelectromechanical systems could have applications in fields as diverse as ultrasensitive mass detection and mechanical computation, and can also be used to explore fundamental phenomena such as quantized heat conductance and quantum-limited displacement. Most nanomechanical studies to date have been performed in the frequency domain. However, applications in computation and information storage will require transient excitation and high-speed time-domain operation of nanomechanical systems. Here we show a time-resolved optical approach to the transduction of ultrahigh-frequency nanoelectromechanical systems, and demonstrate that coherent control of nanomechanical oscillation is possible through appropriate pulse programming. A series of cantilevers with resonant frequencies ranging from less than 10 MHz to over 1 GHz are characterized using the same pulse parameters.