Structured lasing with disordered high-<i>Q</i> perovskite cavities.

Zhou, Zhou; Wang, Shihao; Wen, Wen; Qin, Jiazheng; Chen, Weijin; Tan, Junsheng; Wang, Zhe; Huang, Lingling et al. · Sci Adv · 2026

basic_science · Level V

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Abstract

Nanoscale lasers with low thresholds and on-demand structured light output are essential for compact integrated photonic technology. Introducing engineered disorder into high quality-factor (<i>Q</i>) resonant cavities emerges as a promising route, yet the inaccurate disorder-to-phase correspondence and the limited symmetry breaking mechanisms restrict the achievable optical structures in output lasers. Here, by revealing translational disorder and rotational disorder as two decoupled symmetry-breaking mechanisms, we propose disorder-on-disorder (DoD) meta-cavities that allow for customizing eigenmodes for multichannel lasing emission control while preserving high-<i>Q</i> resonances. In the experiment, we structure perovskite into fully monolithic DoD meta-cavities to maximize mode-gain overlap and demonstrate structured lasing with low threshold (~7 microjoules per square centimeter), high <i>Q</i> (~10<sup>3</sup>), and diverse structured laser arrays including phase/polarization vortices, one-dimensional and two-dimensional Airy beams, and Hermite- and Laguerre-Gaussian beams. Our findings highlight DoD meta-cavity as a distinct and generalized route to compact monolithic high-<i>Q</i> photonic devices, opening opportunities in structured lasers, nonlinear optics, and integrated quantum photonics.