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Zhai X, Ma X, Gao Y, Xing C, Gao M, Dai H, Wang X, Pan A, Schumacher S, Gao T. Electrically Controlling Vortices in a Neutral Exciton-Polariton Condensate at Room Temperature. PHYSICAL REVIEW LETTERS 2023; 131:136901. [PMID: 37831991 DOI: 10.1103/physrevlett.131.136901] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 12/21/2022] [Revised: 06/26/2023] [Accepted: 08/31/2023] [Indexed: 10/15/2023]
Abstract
Manipulating bosonic condensates with electric fields is very challenging as the electric fields do not directly interact with the neutral particles of the condensate. Here we demonstrate a simple electric method to tune the vorticity of exciton-polariton condensates in a strong coupling liquid crystal (LC) microcavity with CsPbBr_{3} microplates as active material at room temperature. In such a microcavity, the LC molecular director can be electrically modulated giving control over the polariton condensation in different modes. For isotropic nonresonant optical pumping we demonstrate the spontaneous formation of vortices with topological charges of +1, +2, -2, and -1. The topological vortex charge is controlled by a voltage in the range of 1 to 10 V applied to the microcavity sample. This control is achieved by the interplay of a built-in potential gradient, the anisotropy of the optically active perovskite microplates, and the electrically controllable LC molecular director in our system with intentionally broken rotational symmetry. Besides the fundamental interest in the achieved electric polariton vortex control at room temperature, our work paves the way to micron-sized emitters with electric control over the emitted light's phase profile and quantized orbital angular momentum for information processing and integration into photonic circuits.
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Affiliation(s)
- Xiaokun Zhai
- Department of Physics, School of Science, Tianjin University, Tianjin 300072, China
- Institute of Molecular Plus, Tianjin University, Tianjin 300072, China
| | - Xuekai Ma
- Department of Physics and Center for Optoelectronics and Photonics Paderborn (CeOPP), Universität Paderborn, Warburger Strasse 100, 33098 Paderborn, Germany
| | - Ying Gao
- Department of Physics, School of Science, Tianjin University, Tianjin 300072, China
- Institute of Molecular Plus, Tianjin University, Tianjin 300072, China
| | - Chunzi Xing
- Tianjin Key Laboratory of Low Dimensional Materials Physics and Preparing Technology, School of Science, Tianjin University, Tianjin 300072, China
| | - Meini Gao
- Tianjin Key Laboratory of Low Dimensional Materials Physics and Preparing Technology, School of Science, Tianjin University, Tianjin 300072, China
| | - Haitao Dai
- Tianjin Key Laboratory of Low Dimensional Materials Physics and Preparing Technology, School of Science, Tianjin University, Tianjin 300072, China
| | - Xiao Wang
- College of Materials Science and Engineering, Hunan University, Changsha 410082, China
| | - Anlian Pan
- College of Materials Science and Engineering, Hunan University, Changsha 410082, China
| | - Stefan Schumacher
- Department of Physics and Center for Optoelectronics and Photonics Paderborn (CeOPP), Universität Paderborn, Warburger Strasse 100, 33098 Paderborn, Germany
- Wyant College of Optical Sciences, University of Arizona, Tucson, Arizona 85721, USA
| | - Tingge Gao
- Department of Physics, School of Science, Tianjin University, Tianjin 300072, China
- Institute of Molecular Plus, Tianjin University, Tianjin 300072, China
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Cookson T, Kalinin K, Sigurdsson H, Töpfer JD, Alyatkin S, Silva M, Langbein W, Berloff NG, Lagoudakis PG. Geometric frustration in polygons of polariton condensates creating vortices of varying topological charge. Nat Commun 2021; 12:2120. [PMID: 33837211 PMCID: PMC8035188 DOI: 10.1038/s41467-021-22121-3] [Citation(s) in RCA: 8] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.7] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 05/05/2020] [Accepted: 02/25/2021] [Indexed: 11/09/2022] Open
Abstract
Vorticity is a key ingredient to a broad variety of fluid phenomena, and its quantised version is considered to be the hallmark of superfluidity. Circulating flows that correspond to vortices of a large topological charge, termed giant vortices, are notoriously difficult to realise and even when externally imprinted, they are unstable, breaking into many vortices of a single charge. In spite of many theoretical proposals on the formation and stabilisation of giant vortices in ultra-cold atomic Bose-Einstein condensates and other superfluid systems, their experimental realisation remains elusive. Polariton condensates stand out from other superfluid systems due to their particularly strong interparticle interactions combined with their non-equilibrium nature, and as such provide an alternative testbed for the study of vortices. Here, we non-resonantly excite an odd number of polariton condensates at the vertices of a regular polygon and we observe the formation of a stable discrete vortex state with a large topological charge as a consequence of antibonding frustration between nearest neighbouring condensates.
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Affiliation(s)
- Tamsin Cookson
- Skolkovo Institute of Science and Technology, Skolkovo, Russian Federation.,Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Southampton, Southampton, UK
| | - Kirill Kalinin
- Skolkovo Institute of Science and Technology, Skolkovo, Russian Federation.,Department of Applied Mathematics and Theoretical Physics, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, UK
| | - Helgi Sigurdsson
- Skolkovo Institute of Science and Technology, Skolkovo, Russian Federation.,Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Southampton, Southampton, UK
| | - Julian D Töpfer
- Skolkovo Institute of Science and Technology, Skolkovo, Russian Federation.,Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Southampton, Southampton, UK
| | - Sergey Alyatkin
- Skolkovo Institute of Science and Technology, Skolkovo, Russian Federation
| | - Matteo Silva
- Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Southampton, Southampton, UK
| | | | - Natalia G Berloff
- Skolkovo Institute of Science and Technology, Skolkovo, Russian Federation. .,Department of Applied Mathematics and Theoretical Physics, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, UK.
| | - Pavlos G Lagoudakis
- Skolkovo Institute of Science and Technology, Skolkovo, Russian Federation. .,Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Southampton, Southampton, UK.
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Ma X, Kartashov YV, Kavokin A, Schumacher S. Chiral condensates in a polariton hexagonal ring. OPTICS LETTERS 2020; 45:5700-5703. [PMID: 33057263 DOI: 10.1364/ol.405400] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 08/14/2020] [Accepted: 09/17/2020] [Indexed: 06/11/2023]
Abstract
We model the generation of vortex modes in exciton-polariton condensates in semiconductor micropillars, arranged into a hexagonal ring molecule, in the presence of TE-TM splitting. This splitting lifts the degeneracy of azimuthally modulated vortex modes with opposite topological charges supported by this structure, so that a number of non-degenerate vortex states characterized by different combinations of topological charges in two polarization components appears. We present a full bifurcation picture for such vortex modes and show that because they have different energies they can be selectively excited by coherent pump beams with specific frequencies and spatial configurations. At high pumping intensity, polariton-polariton interactions give rise to the coupling of different vortex resonances and a bistable regime is achieved.
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