Polariton-Polariton Interactions Revealed in a One-dimensional Whispering Gallery Microcavity.

Tian, Chuan; Zhou, Beier; Xu, Chunyan; Zhang, Yingjun; Zheng, Xiamei; Zhang, Jian; Zhang, Long; Dong, Hongxing et al. · Nano Lett · 2020

basic_science · Level V

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Abstract

Coulomb interactions are essential to the dynamics and optical properties of exciton-polaritons. Here, we report an experimental observation of polariton-polariton interactions far beyond theory in a one-dimensional whispering gallery microcavity. Based on the unique half-light half-matter nature, we were able to clarify the effects of excitons, quantum confinement, and nonthermalized polariton distribution in the measurements of the polaritonic interactions. Spectacularly, our position-scan and power-scan investigations both revealed that the polariton-polariton interaction strength is up to 2 orders of magnitude larger than theoretical predictions. These results suggest that polaritonic interactions are far more complicated than the expectation and should be re-examined in polariton physics and devices involving polaritonic interactions.