Self‐Sustained Oscillations in MoS ₂ Optomechanical Resonators for VHF Optical Radio

We investigate self‐sustained oscillations on microdrum resonators manufactured with molybdenum disulfide, under continuous‐wave laser excitation. Control over these oscillations is demonstrated building a simple radio‐over‐laser link. Applying a DC voltage bias to the device, we strain it and tune the system into an optical resonance condition at which point the drumhead enters a self‐sustained mechanical oscillation regime. This modulates the outgoing light at a fixed VHF frequency that depends on the MoS 2 membrane tension. Exploiting this effect, a frequency modulated message can be encoded into the laser beam by varying the voltage bias around the resonance condition. These developments can have potential applications in free‐space optical communications, range finding, sensing, underwater optical wireless communications and eventually microwave photonics when the working frequencies in both the optical and RF parts are increased.