Variable potentials for thermalized light and coupled condensates
Variable potentials for thermalized light and coupled condensates
复制标题
DOI：
10.1038/nphoton.2017.139
复制
发表时间：
2017-09-01
期刊：
影响因子：
35
通讯作者：
Klaers, Jan
中科院分区：
文献类型：
--
作者：
Dung, David;Kurtscheid, Christian;Klaers, Jan
晶格势中的量子气体已经成为模拟固体物理现象的强大平台，例如Mott绝缘体转变(1)。与超冷原子不同，基于光子的平台，如光子晶体、耦合波导或激光，通常不在热平衡下运行(2-5)。固体平衡效应的光子模拟器的进展包括极化晶格实验(6-10)和光子凝聚体的演示(11，12)。在这里，我们展示了一种技术，通过在超高精细微腔内对染料-聚合物溶液进行热光印迹来产生可变的微光电势。我们研究了单势和双势的性质，发现这种结构的性质对于光的热化和玻色-爱因斯坦凝聚是足够的。有效的光子-光子相互作用的研究以及观察到的位置间的隧道耦合使该系统成为直接填充纠缠光子多体状态的一个很有前途的候选系统。这种可扩展性表明，热光印迹为光子学中的可变微结构提供了一种新的方法。
Quantum gases in lattice potentials have been a powerful platform to simulate phenomena from solid-state physics, such as the Mott insulator transition(1). In contrast to ultracold atoms, photon-based platforms, such as photonic crystals, coupled waveguides or lasers, usually do not operate in thermal equilibrium(2-5). Advances towards photonic simulators of solid-state equilibrium effects include polariton lattice experiments(6-10), and the demonstration of a photon condensate(11,12). Here, we demonstrate a technique to create variable micropotentials for light using thermo-optic imprinting of a dye-polymer solution within an ultrahigh-finesse microcavity. We study the properties of single-and double-well potentials, and find the quality of structuring sufficient for thermalization and Bose-Einstein condensation of light. The investigation of effective photon-photon interactions along with the observed tunnel coupling between sites makes the system a promising candidate to directly populate entangled photonic many-body states. The demonstrated scalability suggests that thermo-optic imprinting provides a new approach for variable microstructuring in photonics.