Proposal for a Mesoscopic Optical Berry-Phase Interferometer

We propose a novel spin-optronic device based on the interference of polaritonic waves traveling in opposite directions and gaining topological Berry phase. It is governed by the ratio of the TE-TM and Zeeman splittings, which can be used to control the output intensity. Because of the peculiar orientation of the TE-TM effective magnetic field for polaritons, there is no analogue of the Aharonov-Casher phase shift existing for electrons.

Figure 1

Orientation of the effective magnetic fields provided by Rashba SOI (full arrows) and TE-TM (dashed arrows) splitting in the reciprocal space.

Figure 2

Possible design of the microcavity waveguide. Letters mark the scattering amplitudes for particle propagation. Because of the flux conservation ${\sigma }^2+2{ϵ}^2=1$ and $r^2+t^2+{ϵ}^2=1$; see Ref. 27 for relevant details. Ellipses show the rotation of the pseudospin of polaritons propagating along the arms of the ring. For clockwise and anticlockwise propagation the rotation direction of the in-plane components of the pseudospin is different, which results in different signs of corresponding Berry phases. Gray (red) arrows show the direction of light propagation; light gray (yellow) arrow shows the direction of the magnetic field.

Figure 3

The intensity of the outgoing polariton beam as a function of the Berry phase ${\theta }_B$. The parameters are $T/\tau =0.05$, $r=0.15$, and $t=0.9$. The inset shows the dependence of ${\theta }_B$ on ${\Delta }_Z/{\Delta }_{LT}$

Figure 4

Real-space images showing calculated emission intensity at Zeeman splitting 0 meV (a),(c) and 2 meV (b),(d) at different moments of time after the injection $t=15\mathrm{ps}$ (a),(b) and $t=30\mathrm{ps}$ (c),(d). Arrows show the direction of injection.