Sich, M. orcid.org/0000-0003-4155-3958, Krizhanovskii, D.N., Skolnick, M.S. orcid.org/0000-0002-3972-8344 et al. (7 more authors) (2011) Observation of bright polariton solitons in a semiconductor microcavity. Nature Photonics, 6. pp. 50-55. ISSN 1749-4885
Abstract
Microcavity polaritons are composite half-light half-matter quasiparticles, which have recently been demonstrated to exhibit rich physical properties, such as non-equilibrium condensation, parametric scattering and superfluidity. At the same time, polaritons have important advantages over photons for information processing, because their excitonic component leads to weaker diffraction and stronger interparticle interactions, implying, respectively, tighter localization and lower powers for nonlinear functionality. Here, we present the first experimental observations of bright polariton solitons in a strongly coupled semiconductor microcavity. The polariton solitons are shown to be micrometre-scale localized non-diffracting wave packets with a corresponding broad spectrum in momentum space. Unlike the solitons known in Bose condensed atomic gases, they are non-equilibrium and rely on a balance between losses and external pumping. Microcavity polariton solitons are excited on picosecond timescales, and thus have further benefits for information processing over light-only solitons in semiconductor cavity lasers, which have nanosecond response times.
Metadata
Item Type: | Article |
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Authors/Creators: |
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Copyright, Publisher and Additional Information: | © 2011 Nature Publishing Group. This is an author produced version of a paper subsequently published in Nature Photonics. Uploaded in accordance with the publisher's self-archiving policy. |
Keywords: | cond-mat.other; cond-mat.other; cond-mat.mes-hall; cond-mat.quant-gas |
Dates: |
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Institution: | The University of Sheffield |
Academic Units: | The University of Sheffield > Faculty of Science (Sheffield) > Department of Physics and Astronomy (Sheffield) |
Depositing User: | Symplectic Sheffield |
Date Deposited: | 09 May 2018 15:43 |
Last Modified: | 09 May 2018 15:43 |
Published Version: | http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/nphoton.2011.267 |
Status: | Published |
Publisher: | Nature Publishing Group |
Refereed: | Yes |
Identification Number: | 10.1038/nphoton.2011.267 |
Related URLs: | |
Open Archives Initiative ID (OAI ID): | oai:eprints.whiterose.ac.uk:130265 |