Soliton Instabilities and Vortex Streets Formation in a Polariton Quantum Fluid

TL;DR

This paper investigates the formation and decay of dark solitons and vortex streets in polariton quantum fluids, revealing how disorder-induced perturbations lead to soliton instabilities and vortex formation.

Contribution

It provides the first time-resolved experimental observation of soliton decay into vortex streets in polariton fluids, highlighting the role of disorder-induced instabilities.

Findings

Dark solitons decay into vortex streets.

Disorder-induced transverse perturbations cause soliton instabilities.

Time-resolved measurements enable quantitative analysis of soliton dynamics.

Abstract

Exciton-polaritons have been shown to be an optimal system in order to investigate the properties of bosonic quantum fluids. We report here on the observation of dark solitons in the wake of engineered circular obstacles and their decay into streets of quantized vortices. Our experiments provide a time-resolved access to the polariton phase and density, which allows for a quantitative study of instabilities of freely evolving polaritons. The decay of solitons is quantified and identified as an effect of disorder-induced transverse perturbations in the dissipative polariton gas.