2024/01/11 by Christoph Bennenhei, Hangyong Shan, Bennenhei, Christoph +19 · 3 citations
Engineering · Materials Science · Physics and Astronomy · #FOS: Physical sciences #Mesoscale and Nanoscale Physics (cond-mat.mes-hall) #Molecular Junctions and Nanostructures #Optics (physics.optics) #Porphyrin and Phthalocyanine Chemistry #Strong Light-Matter Interactions
paper · pdf · doi:10.48550/arxiv.2401.06267
openalex publication_date 2024/01/11 · openalex created_date 2024/01/16 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/28
Organic molecule exciton-polaritons in photonic lattices are a versatile platform to emulate unconventional phases of matter at ambient conditions, including protected interface modes in topological insulators. Here, we investigate bosonic condensation in the most prototypical higher-order topological lattice: a 2D-version of the Su-Schrieffer-Heeger (SSH) model, supporting both 0D and 1D topological modes. We study fluorescent protein-filled, structured microcavities defining a staggered photonic trapping potential and observe the resulting first- and higher-order topologically protected modes via spatially resolved photoluminescence spectroscopy. We account for the spatial mode patterns by tight-binding calculations and theoretically characterize the topological invariants of the lattice. Under strong optical pumping, we observe bosonic condensation into the topological modes. Via interferometric measurements, we map the spatial first-order coherence in the protected 1D modes extending over 10 microns. Our findings pave the way towards organic on-chip polaritonics using higher-order topology as a tool for the generation of robustly confined polaritonic lasing states.