Abstract
The study of topological phases of light underpins a promising paradigm for engineering disorder-immune compact photonic devices with unusual properties. Combined with an optical gain, topological photonic structures provide a novel platform for micro- and nanoscale lasers, which could benefit from nontrivial band topology and spatially localized gap states. Here, we propose and demonstrate experimentally active nanophotonic topological cavities incorporating III–V semiconductor quantum wells as a gain medium in the structure. We observe room-temperature lasing with a narrow spectrum, high coherence, and threshold behaviour. The emitted beam hosts a singularity encoded by a triade cavity mode that resides in the bandgap of two interfaced valley-Hall periodic photonic lattices with opposite parity breaking. Our findings make a step towards topologically controlled ultrasmall light sources with nontrivial radiation characteristics.
Highlights
Topological phases of light provide unique opportunities to create photonic systems immune to scattering losses and disorder[1]
Topologically robust wave transport typically relies on symmetry-protected edge states supported by interfaces between domains characterized by distinct topological invariants[2]
The synergy between non-Hermiticity and topology in active optical systems offers both new physics governed by nonHermitian Hamiltonians[3,4] and potential applications for the design of topological lasers with superior characteristics and tolerance to fabrication imperfections[5,6,7,8,9,10,11]
Summary
Topological phases of light provide unique opportunities to create photonic systems immune to scattering losses and disorder[1]. We demonstrate lowthreshold lasing under uniform pumping from highquality cavity modes hosted within the topological bandgap of the structure.
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