Photonic Berry curvature in double liquid crystal microcavities with broken inversion symmetry

We investigate a photonic device consisting of two coupled optical cavities possessing Rashba-Dresselhaus spin-orbit coupling, TE-TM splitting, and linear polarization splitting that opens a tunable energy gap at the diabolic points of the photon dispersion; giving rise to an actively addressable local Berry curvature. The proposed architecture stems from recent advancements in the design of artificial photonic gauge fields in liquid crystal cavities [K. Rechcinska et al., Science 366, 727 (2019)]. Our study opens perspectives for topological photonics, room-temperature spinoptronics, and studies on the quantum geometrical structure of photonic bands in extreme settings.

Automated summary

The study introduces a photonic device with two coupled optical cavities that utilize Rashba-Dresselhaus spin-orbit coupling and TE-TM splitting to open a tunable energy gap at the diabolic points of the photon dispersion, generating an actively addressable local Berry curvature. This research opens new perspectives for topological photonics, room-temperature spintronics, and studies on the quantum geometrical structure of photonic bands in extreme settings.