Exceptional swallowtail degeneracies in driven-dissipative quadrature squeezing

We show that swallowtail catastrophe consisting of various-order non-Hermitian and Hermitian degeneracies naturally exists in the dynamics of two-mode driven-dissipative quadrature squeezing systems that break pseudo-Hermiciticy by judiciously engineered losses. We reveal that the swallowtail degeneracy structure enables nontrivial braiding of complex eigenvalues by looping around an exceptional line in the parameter space. Our findings provide a comprehensive understanding of the degeneracy geometry in two-mode driven-dissipative bosonic quadratic systems, opening pathways toward topologically nontrivial control of Gaussian states. Published by the American Physical Society 2024