Topological operations around exceptional points via shortcuts to adiabaticity

The existence of exceptional points (EPs) in the spectrum of non-Hermitian Hamiltonians leads to a nontrivial spectral topology that can be exploited to generate topological operations. However, their implementation has remained elusive due to the difficulty of generating a true adiabatic evolution. Here, we develop fast, robust control protocols that generate a desired topological operation. Our strategy relies on shortcuts to adiabaticity, but is not a trivial extension. The presence of EPs renders the strategy developed for Hermitian Hamiltonians impractical as it will lead to faulty control protocols. Moreover, due to the dynamics sensitivity to parameter uncertainties, not all shortcuts to adiabaticity can be used in a realistic setting. We illustrate our method in the context of a two-mode non-Hermitian Hamiltonian and discuss why in general celebrated shortcuts to adiabaticity like transitionless driving and superadiabatic transitionless are not appropriate control protocols for non-Hermitian systems.