Non-Hermitian topological light steering
How to define a light path topologically
Controlling the flow of light in a robust and flexible manner will be critical for the development of the next generation of photonic integrated devices. Exploiting the inherent protection afforded by topology, topological photonics provides a solution for the robust propagation of light. Devices so far, however, have been fixed in their functionality. Zhao et al. created light paths that can be arbitrarily switched on and off by optical illumination. Propagation can be topologically steered along desired pathways by manipulating regions of gain and loss within the photonic structure through optical excitation. This approach provides a route to controlling topologically protected light paths in an integrated optical platform.
Science, this issue p. 1163
Abstract
Photonic topological insulators provide a route for disorder-immune light transport, which holds promise for practical applications. Flexible reconfiguration of topological light pathways can enable high-density photonics routing, thus sustaining the growing demand for data capacity. By strategically interfacing non-Hermitian and topological physics, we demonstrate arbitrary, robust light steering in reconfigurable non-Hermitian junctions, in which chiral topological states can propagate at an interface of the gain and loss domains. Our non-Hermitian–controlled topological state can enable the dynamic control of robust transmission links of light inside the bulk, fully using the entire footprint of a photonic topological insulator.
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Supplementary Material
Summary
Supplementary Text
Figs. S1 to S9
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Materials, methods, and additional information are available as supplementary materials.
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Published In
Science
Volume 365 | Issue 6458
13 September 2019
13 September 2019
Copyright
Copyright © 2019 The Authors, some rights reserved; exclusive licensee American Association for the Advancement of Science. No claim to original U.S. Government Works.
This is an article distributed under the terms of the Science Journals Default License.
Submission history
Received: 20 May 2019
Accepted: 15 August 2019
Published in print: 13 September 2019
Acknowledgments
Funding: We acknowledge the support from U.S. Army Research Office (ARO) (W911NF-19-1-0249) and the National Science Foundation (NSF) (ECCS-1846766 and CMMI-1635026). This research was partially supported by NSF through the University of Pennsylvania Materials Research Science and Engineering Center (MRSEC) (DMR-1720530). This work was carried out in part at the Singh Center for Nanotechnology, which is supported by the NSF National Nanotechnology Coordinated Infrastructure Program under grant NNCI-1542153. Author contributions: H.Z., L.F., and S.L. conceived the project. H.Z. conducted the design. H.Z., T.W., B.M., and S.L. constructed the theoretical model. X.Q. fabricated the samples. H.Z., T.W., X.Q., and L.F. performed the measurements and data analyses. L.F. guided the research. All authors contributed to manuscript preparation and discussion. Competing interests: The authors declare no competing interests. Data and materials availability: All data are available in the manuscript or the supplementary materials.
Authors
Funding Information
National Science Foundation: ECCS-1846766; CMMI-1635026; DMR-1720530
Army Research Office: W911NF-19-1-0249
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