Quantum optomechanics with acoustic waves is an emerging new area within optomechanics with significant potential to engineer and utilize quantum states at a macroscopic scale. In this talk, a Brillouin optomechanical platform will be discussed that unites several favorable properties including high mechanical frequency (~ 10 GHz), very low optical loss and absorption, and back-scatter operation, thus offering a promising route to circumvent existing experimental challenges. Using this system, we (i) observe Brillouin optomechanical strong coupling between the optical cavity field and these high-frequency mechanical vibrations, which enables optical control at a rate that exceeds the system's decay rates, and (ii) perform heralded single-phonon addition and subtraction to a mechanical thermal state, which has the counterintuitive effect of approximately doubling the mean thermal occupation. Having both capabilities provides a powerful toolkit for quantum control with phonons.
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