Optical skyrmions and other topological quasiparticles of light

By Yijie Shen, Qiang Zhang, Peng Shi, L. Du, Anatoly V. Zayats, Xiaocong Yuan. Nature Photonics, 2022

370 citations recorded by the source corpus.

Skyrmions are topologically stable quasiparticles that have been predicted and demonstrated in quantum fields, solid-state physics and magnetic materials, but only recently observed in electromagnetic fields. Here we review the recent advances in optical skyrmions within a unified topological framework. Starting from fundamental theories and classification of skyrmionic states, we describe generation and topological control of different kinds of skyrmions in evanescent, structured and spatiotemporal optical fields. We further highlight generalized classes of optical topological quasiparticles beyond skyrmions and outline the emerging applications, future trends and open challenges. A complex vectorial field structure of optical quasiparticles with versatile topological characteristics emerges as an important feature in modern spin optics, imaging, metrology, optical forces, structured light, and topological and quantum technologies. Advances in the understanding of optical skyrmions, within a unified topological framework, are reviewed. The field structure of such optical quasiparticles, and their topological characteristics, may be useful for fields ranging from imaging to quantum technologies.

Subfields: Atomic and Molecular Physics, and Optics, Electrical and Electronic Engineering

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/c210b3db9ae743e87bb0bdd3dd97cd0428881fa1

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In Atomic and Molecular Physics, and Optics

In Electrical and Electronic Engineering

Citations in the corpus

Roadmap on spatiotemporal light fields (2022, background): “tures of quasiparticles in condensed matters [9], and to excite”