Spatial dynamics of exciton-polariton condensates in inhomogeneous potentials

• Main Author: Tan, En Zhi
• Other Authors: Timothy Liew C. H.
• Format: Final Year Project
• Language: English
• Published: 2019
• Subjects: DRNTU::Science::Physics
• Online Access: http://hdl.handle.net/10356/76437
• Institution: Nanyang Technological University

Exciton-polaritons are hybrid light-matter quasiparticles forming in semiconductor microcavities. By combining the light effective mass of photons with the thermalizing behavior of an electronic system, the particles are able to undergo a form of Bose-Einstein condensation at considerably higher temperature than more traditional condensates of cold-atoms. In addition, exciton-polaritons can be controlled by changing their potential energy landscape, which may have both real and imaginary components (imaginary components corresponding to non-uniform gain and loss). In the first part of the project, the spin-dependent splitting of whispering gallery modes formed in mesa traps is studied and a theoretical model to explain the phenomenon based on the optical spin Hall effect is presented. In the second part of the project, we present a theoretical scheme for the realisation of unidirectional transmission of exciton-polariton signals in a spin-dependent micropillar chain and study the dynamics of such a system.