Abstract
Topological photonics has revolutionized our understanding of light propagation, providing a robust way to manipulate light. So far, most of studies in this field are focused on designing a static photonic structure. Developing a dynamic photonic topological platform to switch multiple topological functionalities at ultrafast speed is still a great challenge. Here we theoretically propose and experimentally demonstrate a reprogrammable plasmonic topological insulator, where the topological propagation route can be dynamically changed at nanosecond-level switching time, leading to an experimental demonstration of ultrafast multi-channel optical analog-digital converter. Due to the innovative use of electric switches to implement the programmability of plasmonic topological insulator, each unit cell can be encoded by dynamically controlling its digital plasmonic states while keeping its geometry and material parameters unchanged. Our reprogrammable topological plasmonic platform is fabricated by the printed circuit board technology, making it much more compatible with integrated photoelectric systems. Furthermore, due to its flexible programmability, many photonic topological functionalities can be integrated into this versatile topological platform.
Highlights
Topological photonics has revolutionized our understanding of light propagation, providing a robust way to manipulate light
The beginnings of topological photonics can be traced to the efforts to emulate the quantum Hall effect (QHE), where the time-reversal symmetry of the system is broken by exploiting magneto-optic photonic crystals under external static magnetic fields[1,2,3,4,5,6]
By investigating the band diagrams of the proposed reprogrammable plasmonic topological insulator (RPTI), we shown that a topological bandgap emulating quantum valley-Hall effect (QVHE) can be created by digitally encoding its unit cells via switching electrically the PIN diodes “on” and “off”
Summary
Topological photonics has revolutionized our understanding of light propagation, providing a robust way to manipulate light. Multiple photonic topological functionalities are expected to be achieved in a single but reconfigurable PTI, so that the time and costs associated with the design and fabrication process can be reduced To this end, several key works on reconfigurable topological insulators[20,21,22,23,24,25] have been reported recently, in which the reconfigurability is mostly implemented by changing either the geometry or material parameters. Our RPTI is fabricated by a widely-used printed circuit board (PCB) technology, and it can be seamlessly integrated with the commonly used PCB-based photoelectric integrated circuits These unique features are crucial for the development of versatile and intelligent topological photoelectric devices for future practical applications
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