Nonlinear symmetry breaking in photo-metamaterials

TL;DR

This paper introduces photo-metamaterials with integrated photodiodes and LEDs, demonstrating how optical feedback induces nonlinear symmetry breaking and enables new harmonic generation phenomena at certain incident light intensities.

Contribution

It presents a novel design of photo-metamaterials that exhibit nonlinear symmetry breaking and harmonic generation due to integrated optical feedback mechanisms.

Findings

Symmetry breaking occurs above a specific incident light intensity threshold.

Second-harmonic generation emerges abruptly due to symmetry breaking.

Third-harmonic signals are reduced as a consequence of the nonlinear response.

Abstract

We design and analyze photo-metamaterials with each meta-atom containing both photodiode and light-emitting diode. Illumination of the photodiode by the light-emitting diode gives rise to an additional optical feedback within each unit cell, which strongly affects resonant properties and nonlinear response of the meta-atom. In particular, we demonstrate that symmetry breaking occurs upon a certain threshold magnitude of the incident wave intensity resulting in an abrupt emergence of second-harmonic generation, which was not originally available, as well as in the reduced third-harmonic signal.