Spin and Geometric Phase Control Four‐Wave Mixing from Metasurfaces

Abstract

The spin angular momentum of light plays an important role in nonlinear interactions in optical systems with rotational symmetries. Here, the existence of the nonlinear geometric Berry phase is demonstrated in the four‐wave mixing process and applied to spin‐controlled nonlinear light generation from plasmonic metasurfaces. The polarization state of four‐wave mixing from the ultrathin metasurfaces, comprising gold meta‐atoms with four‐fold rotational symmetry, can be controlled by manipulating the spin of the excitation beams. The mutual orientation of the meta‐atoms in the metasurface influences the intensity of four‐wave mixing via the geometric phase effects. These findings provide novel solutions for designing metasurfaces for spin‐controlled nonlinear optical processes with inbuilt all‐optical switching.

Multidimensional manipulation of wave fields based on artificial microstructures

“…Based on the nonlinear geometric phase, nonlinear metalenses 180 and nonlinear diffraction 181 for second harmonic generation (SHG) signals have also been real-ized. Besides manipulating the phases of harmonic signals, the phases of nonlinear four-wave mixing (FWM) signals can also be manipulated 175,182 . As shown in Fig.…”

Metasurfaces: Subwavelength nanostructure arrays for ultrathin flat optics and photonics

“…87,102,103,105 Nonlinear and quantum metasurfaces Using metasurfaces with subwavelength control over polarization enables control of nonlinear optical processes, such as second-harmonic and third-harmonic generation 106 (as discussed in the Pertsch and Kivshar article in this issue 107 ) and four-wave mixing. 108 Symmetry selection rules in harmonic generation have been observed in nonlinear optical chirality using meta-atoms, or the artificial atoms constituting the metasurfaces. 109,110 Nonlinear geometric Berry phase and nonlinear spin-orbit interactions have been observed using metasurfaces, 108,[110][111][112] and nonlinear wavefront engineering 113,114 can be achieved using metasurfaces.…”

“…108 Symmetry selection rules in harmonic generation have been observed in nonlinear optical chirality using meta-atoms, or the artificial atoms constituting the metasurfaces. 109,110 Nonlinear geometric Berry phase and nonlinear spin-orbit interactions have been observed using metasurfaces, 108,[110][111][112] and nonlinear wavefront engineering 113,114 can be achieved using metasurfaces.…”

Four‐Wave Mixing Holographic Multiplexing Based on Nonlinear Metasurfaces

“…While many previous works mainly focus on the harmonic generation, a more general four‐wave mixing (FWM) process has not been fully explored. Some previous works have been done on FWM nonlinear effects such as complex amplitude control, efficiency enhancement, and frequency comb generation . Few works have focused on the metasurfaces' holographic multiplexing utilizing the effects of FWM, which may open new frontiers for multifunctionalities.…”