Polaritonics using two-dimensional atomic crystals

基于二维晶体半导体中半光半物质准粒子(微腔极化子)的超快开关结构光子学领域通过在电信、显示技术、医学、传感、娱乐、替代能源系统以及量子信息学等半未来技术中的应用，对我们的生活产生了巨大的影响。这些应用中使用的下一代光子系统和子系统将需要以超快速率(Tbps)运行，并且应该能够执行全光数据路由和处理，即使在几个光子级别。在这种背景下，人们主要致力于实现纯光子交换结构，以取代其电子对应的结构，从而导致更大的功率需求和更大的占地面积。这个问题在这里是通过利用混合系统来解决的，该系统充分利用了电子学和光子学的优点。具体地说，开关结构将依赖于在二维晶体半导体中实现的被称为微腔极化子的半光半物质准粒子。它们有望成为实现低能量、超快、宽带、经典和量子水平信号处理的开关和门以及图像处理的理想平台。这项研究还将有助于从根本上理解纳米尺度上的光-物质相互作用。这项工作将在包括光学、材料科学和凝聚态物理在内的新兴领域为来自不同社会经济背景和代表性不足的社区的研究生、本科生和高中生提供独特的跨学科科学教育。技术：利用光子和物质的优势，这项研究计划将研究光物质准粒子(微腔极化子)作为超快低能量开关和信号处理的平台。具体地说，将利用过渡金属二卤化物的二维激子与腔光子之间的强耦合形成的微腔极化子。通过结合二维材料的新的物理性质，如谷和自旋自由度，将开发出在室温下同时执行强度和偏振开关的微腔极化开关。此外，还将集成这些开关以演示逻辑门操作。傅里叶空间光谱和泵浦探测技术将被用来表征非线性极化发射和开关动力学。室温极化子开关和逻辑元件的发展代表着传统的基于光子或电子的信号处理系统的重大偏离和进步。

Title: Ultrafast switching architectures based on half-light half-matter quasiparticles (microcavity polaritons) in two-dimensional crystalline semiconductorsThe field of photonics has had tremendous impact on our lives through applications in telecommunication, display technology, medicine, sensing, entertainment, alternative energy systems and in semi-futuristic technologies such as quantum informatics. The next generation photonic systems and subsystems used in these applications will need to operate at ultrafast rates (Tbps) and should be capable of performing all-optical data routing and processing even at few photon levels. In this context, effort has mostly been directed towards realizing purely photonic switching architectures to replace their electronic counterparts resulting in larger power requirement and bigger footprint. This issue is addressed here by exploiting hybrid systems that take the best of electronics and photonics. Specifically, the switching architectures will rely on half-light half-matter quasiparticles called microcavity polaritons realized in two-dimensional crystalline semiconductors. They are expected to be an ideal platform to realize low energy, ultrafast, wide bandwidth, switches and gates for signal processing at classical and quantum levels, and image processing. The study will also contribute to fundamental understanding of light-matter interaction at the nanoscale. This work will provide unique inter-disciplinary scientific education in an emerging field encompassing optics, materials science and condensed matter physics to graduate, undergraduate and high school students from diverse socio-economic backgrounds and under-represented communities. Technical: Exploiting the benefit of both photons and matter, this research program will investigate light-matter quasiparticles (microcavity polaritons) as a platform for ultrafast low energy switching and signal processing. Specifically, microcavity polaritons formed by the strong coupling between the two-dimensional excitons of transition metal dichalcogenides and cavity photons will be utilized. By combining the novel physical properties of the two-dimensional materials such as valley and spin degrees of freedom, microcavity polariton switches that perform both intensity and polarization switching at room temperature will be developed. In addition, these switches will be integrated to demonstrate logic gate operations. Fourier space spectroscopy and pump-probe techniques will be used to characterize the nonlinear polariton emission and the switching dynamics. The development of room temperature polaritonic switching and logic elements represents a significant departure and advancement from traditional photon based or electron based signal processing systems.