Study of brownian motion at short time scales
We experimentally study the brownian motion of an optically trapped micrometric particle in liquids at ultrashort timescales in order to reveal the effects of fluid compressibility on its dynamics.
To that purpose, standard trapping and detection schemes are coupled to femtosecond "pump-probe" experiment to take advantage of the high temporal resolution of time resolved ultrafast spectroscopy experiments. The goal is to achieve a proper measurement of the instantaneous velocity of the brownian particle beyond the ballistic regime to probe the influence of compressibility effects on the motion of the trapped sphere, measurement that has never been made and remains elusive. The expected spatial and temporal resolutions ($0.15$ fm at $1$ ps) provided by these techniques will allow us to measure the Velocity Auto Correlation Function to obtain an evidence of compressibility effects on the particle dynamic.
This type of study provides new features into investigations of non equilibrium physics related to brownian motion and optical tweezers.