Emulation of the Graphene structure using photonics
Final Report Abstract
In this project, we addressed multiple physical phenomena. The novelty of our work stems from the fruitful combination of insights from optical science with solid state physics in order to explore fundamental concepts of graphene, for the advancement of fundamental science as well as photonic and electronic applications. By exploiting the analogy between the propagation of electrons in graphene and the propagation of photons in honeycomb photonic structures, we fabricated novel photonic devices with unprecedented properties, laid the theoretical foundation for their description and understanding, and transferred the results to graphene, where possible. Taking advantage of the ease of fabrication of “photonic graphene” devices, we were not limited to perfect honeycomb lattices, but instead used our experimental techniques to modify the lattice in ways that are far beyond the capabilities of in carbon-based graphene. We exploited the impact of strain, disorder and non-Hermiticity on the graphene structure, we probed new states inaccessible to conventional graphene, and we controlled the existence of these states in the fabricated structures. In the field of solid state physics and materials science, we were able to explore phenomena which are much easier to demonstrate and study in honeycomb photonic structures than in graphene itself. However, these findings are associated with the honeycomb structure and Dirac dispersion relation that the two class of materials share. In this vein, a full understanding of the implications of the unique geometry of graphene will facilitate the refinement of existing models for the graphene structure as well as the development of new ideas and concepts in various fields. In detail, our results comprise: • the first analysis of quantum correlations at the edges of the graphene lattice • the first demonstration of a 2D PT-symmetric crystal, based on the graphene lattice • the first demonstration of universal sign control of the evanescent inter-site hopping • the first analytic description of the Goos-Hähnchen shift in photonic graphene • the first observation of topological protection of photonic path entanglement • the first observation of compact two-dimensional localized states on a flat band.
Publications
- “Observation of localized states in Lieb photonic lattices,” Phys. Rev. Lett. 114(24), 245503 (2015)
R. A. Vicencio, C. Cantillano, L. Morales-Inostroza, B. Real, C. Mejía-Cortés, S. Weimann, A. Szameit, and M. I. Molina
(See online at https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevLett.114.245503) - “Two-particle quantum correlations at graphene edges,” 2D Mater. 2(3), 034005 (2015)
M. Gräfe and A. Szameit
(See online at https://doi.org/10.1088/2053-1583/2/3/034005) - “Topological Protection of Photonic Path Entanglement,” Optica 3(9), 925-930 (2016)
M. C. Rechtsman, Y. Lumer, Y. Plotnik, A. Perez-Leija, A. Szameit, and M. Segev
(See online at https://doi.org/10.1364/OPTICA.3.000925) - “Universal Sign Control of Coupling in Tight-Binding Lattices,” Phys. Rev. Lett. 116(21), 213901 (2016)
R. Keil, C. Poli, M. Heinrich, J. Arkinstall, G. Weihs, H. Schomerus, and A. Szameit
(See online at https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevLett.116.213901) - “Observation of photonic anomalous Floquet Topological Insulators,” Nature Commun. 8, 13756 (2017)
L. J. Maczewsky, J. M. Zeuner, S. Nolte, and A. Szameit
(See online at https://doi.org/10.1038/ncomms13756) - “Demonstration of a two-dimensional PT-symmetric crystal,” Nature Commun. (in press)
M. Kremer, T. Biesenthal, L. J. Maczewsky, M. Heinrich, R. Thomale, and A. Szameit
(See online at https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-018-08104-x)
