Rabi oscillations of bound states in the continuum

TL;DR

This paper investigates Rabi oscillations in photonic systems with bound states in the continuum (BICs), demonstrating how symmetry breaking and extended couplings lead to quasi-BIC states and enable photon oscillations.

Contribution

It introduces a novel mechanism for sustaining Rabi oscillations in BIC-based photonic structures by breaking symmetry and incorporating non-nearest neighbor couplings.

Findings

Doublet of quasi-BIC states can be sustained with symmetry breaking.

Weakly-damped Rabi oscillations of photons are observed.

Extended couplings enable control over photon dynamics.

Abstract

Photonic bound states in the continuum (BICs) are special localized and non-decaying states of a photonic system with a frequency embedded into the spectrum of scattered states. The simplest photonic structure displaying a single BIC is provided by two waveguides side-coupled to a common waveguide lattice, where the BIC is protected by symmetry. Here we consider such a simple photonic structure and show that, breaking mirror symmetry and allowing for non-nearest neighbor couplings, a doublet of quasi-BIC states can be sustained, enabling weakly-damped embedded Rabi oscillations of photons between the waveguides.