2017/03/31 by Janos Perczel, Johannes Borregaard, Darrick E. Chang +4 · 2 citations
Physics and Astronomy · #quant-ph #physics.atom-ph #physics.optics
paper · pdf · doi:10.1103/physrevlett.119.023603
published as Phys. Rev. Lett. 119, 023603 (2017) · 11 pages and 9 figures; paper updated to match published version
arxiv created 2017/07/17 · arxiv updated 2017/07/19
We demonstrate that two-dimensional atomic emitter arrays with subwavelength spacing constitute topologically protected quantum optical systems where the photon propagation is robust against large imperfections while losses associated with free space emission are strongly suppressed. Breaking time-reversal symmetry with a magnetic field results in gapped photonic bands with non-trivial Chern numbers and topologically protected, long-lived edge states. Due to the inherent nonlinearity of constituent emitters, such systems provide a platform for exploring quantum optical analogues of interacting topological systems.