Electrically controlled spin angular momentum of light through lithium niobate domain engineering
The investigations of spin angular momentum (SAM) of light have demonstrated many interesting photonic-spin-dependent effects. However, it is still a great challenge to manipulate a photonic SAM state in a designable and dynamic way. Here we propose to electrically control the SAM of light through lithium niobate (LN) domain engineering. In our design, each unit cell consists of a pair of positive and negative domains, which introduces a spin-dependent geometric phase. One can feasibly tune such geometric phase by applying an electric field. After properly arranging LN domains, we have successfully achieved a designed geometric phase distribution for electrically controlled separation of photonic SAM states. Our work paves the way to dynamically manipulate the SAM of light for high-speed beam steering, switchable wave front shaping, and dynamic holography.
Authors
- Min Xiao (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-0718-9518)
- Yue Wu (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-7170-0053)
- Xiaoyi Xu (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-3914-3167)
- Yong Zhang (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-1158-2248)
- Chao Zhou (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-6873-6140)
- Zhilin Ye (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-2181-5001)
- Shining N. Zhu (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-3472-6497)
- Pengcheng Chen (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-2018-5594)
- Yawen Su
- Xuejing Cui (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-7385-0917)
- Xiaopeng Hu (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1630-109X)
Institutions
- Collaborative Innovation Center of Advanced Microstructures (CN)
- Nanjing University (CN)
Publication Details
- Journal
- Physical Review Research
- Published
- 2025-04-21
- DOI
- https://doi.org/10.1103/physrevresearch.7.023074
- Primary Topic
- Photorefractive and Nonlinear Optics
- Type
- article
- Field-Weighted Citation Impact
- 0.00
Funders
- National Natural Science Foundation of China
- China Postdoctoral Science Foundation
- Government of Jiangsu Province
- Nanjing University
- Outstanding Youth Foundation of Jiangsu Province of China
- National Postdoctoral Program for Innovative Talents
- National Key Research and Development Program of China
- Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities