Manifestation of PT symmetry breaking in polarization space with terahertz metasurfaces

By utilizing the vector nature of light as well as the inherent anisotropy of artificial meta-atoms, we investigate parity time symmetry breaking in polarization space using a metasurface with anisotropic absorption, whose building blocks consist of two orthogonally orientated meta-atoms with the sa...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Physical review letters 2014-08, Vol.113 (9), p.093901-093901
Main Authors: Lawrence, Mark, Xu, Ningning, Zhang, Xueqian, Cong, Longqing, Han, Jiaguang, Zhang, Weili, Zhang, Shuang
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Anisotropy
Broken symmetry
Coalescing
Mathematical analysis
Phase transformations
Polarization
Symmetry
Terahertz frequencies
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Summary:By utilizing the vector nature of light as well as the inherent anisotropy of artificial meta-atoms, we investigate parity time symmetry breaking in polarization space using a metasurface with anisotropic absorption, whose building blocks consist of two orthogonally orientated meta-atoms with the same resonant frequency but different loss coefficients. By varying their coupling strength, we directly observe a phase transition in the eigenpolarization states of the system, across which the long axis of the eigenpolarization ellipses experience a sudden rotation of 45°. Despite the lack of rotational symmetry of the metasurface, precisely at the phase transition, known as the exceptional point, the eigenmodes coalesce into a single circularly polarized state. The PT symmetric metasurfaces are experimentally implemented at terahertz frequencies.
ISSN:0031-9007
1079-7114
DOI:10.1103/PhysRevLett.113.093901