Storing Light Near an Exceptional Point

Overview

Journal Nat Commun

Specialty Biology

Date 2024 Sep 16

PMID 39285203

Authors

Yicheng Zhu

Jiankun Hou

Qi Geng

Boyi Xue

Yuping Chen

Xianfeng Chen

Li Ge

Wenjie Wan

Affiliations

Soon will be listed here.

Abstract

Photons with zero rest mass are impossible to be stopped. However, a pulse of light can be slowed down and even halted through strong light-matter interaction in a dispersive medium in atomic systems. Exceptional point (EP), a non-Hermitian singularity point, can introduce an abrupt transition in dispersion. Here we experimentally observe room-temperature storing light near an exceptional point induced by nonlinear Brillouin scattering in a chip-scale 90-μm-radius optical microcavity, the smallest platform up to date to store light. Through nonlinear coupling, a Parity-Time (PT) symmetry can be constructed in optical-acoustical hybrid modes, where Brillouin scattering-induced absorption (BSIA) can lead to both slow light and fast light of incoming pulses. A subtle transition of slow-to-fast light reveals a critical point for storing a light pulse up to half a millisecond. This compact and room-temperature scheme of storing light paves the way for practical applications in all-optical communications and quantum information processing.

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