2024/05/03 by Marc R. Bourgeois, Bourgeois, Marc R., Andrew W. Rossi +3 · 1 citation
Physics and Astronomy · #Atomic and Subatomic Physics Research #Crystallography and Radiation Phenomena #FOS: Physical sciences #Materials Science (cond-mat.mtrl-sci) #Nuclear Physics and Applications
paper · pdf · doi:10.48550/arxiv.2405.01826
openalex publication_date 2024/05/03 · openalex created_date 2024/05/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/28
Chiral phonons possessing valley pseudo angular momentum (PAM) underlie a diversity of quantum phenomena of fundamental and applied importance, but are challenging to probe directly. We show that deficiencies of typical momentum-resolved electron energy loss measurements that make it impossible to distinguish the PAM of chiral phonons can be overcome by introducing pinwheel free electron states with well-defined PAM. Transitions between such states generate 2D periodic arrays of in-plane field vortices with polarization textures tailored to selectively couple to desired chiral mode symmetries.