Levitated macroscopic rotors with 10 hours of free spin at room temperature.

Authors

Xianfeng Chen, Nirmala Raj, Ruvi Lecamwasam, Mingxi Chen, Christina Yuan Ling Tan, Syed M Assad, Ping Koy Lam

Published in

Nature communications. Jul 06, 2026. Epub Jul 06, 2026.

Abstract

Low-dissipation rotors with large angular momentum are essential for precision sensing and probing macroscopic quantum phenomena. To date, low dissipation can only be achieved for micro-scale rotors. Here, we report a diamagnetically levitated millimeter-scale rotor exhibiting a measured dissipation rate as low as 3.85 μHz at room temperature, corresponding to a free spinning duration exceeding 10 hours. The rotor is levitated stably over an axisymmetric permanent magnet trap, and can be driven up to 930 RPM using contactless electrostatic actuation in high vacuum. Leveraging its low damping rate and large angular momentum, we realize a precision gyroscope with a measured sensitivity of 6.5 × 10^-3 °/s and an estimated thermal-limited stability of $5.7\times 10^{-7^{\circ }}/\sqrt{h}$. These results establish diamagnetic levitation as a promising room-temperature platform for high-performance sensors.

PMID:
42409816
Bibliographic data and abstract were imported from PubMed on 07 Jul 2026.

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