Topological metasurface: From passive toward active and beyond

TL;DR

This review discusses recent advances in topological metasurfaces, highlighting their passive, active, and quantum regimes, and explores their potential for novel optical and quantum applications.

Contribution

It provides a comprehensive overview of the latest developments in topological metasurfaces, including passive, active, and quantum regimes, and discusses future challenges and directions.

Findings

Passive topological phenomena in 2D photonic systems

Active topological metasurfaces with nonlinear and reconfigurable features

Potential for quantum information and many-body physics applications

Abstract

Metasurfaces are subwavelength structured thin films consisting of arrays of units that allow the controls of polarization, phase and amplitude of light over a subwavelength thickness. The recent developments in topological photonics have greatly broadened the horizon in designing the metasurfaces for novel functional applications. In this review, we summarize recent progress in the research field of topological metasurfaces, firstly from the perspectives of passive and active in the classical regime, and then in the quantum regime. More specifically, we begin by examining the passive topological phenomena in two-dimensional photonic systems, including both time-reversal broken systems and time-reversal preserved systems. Subsequently, we move to discuss the cutting-edge studies of the active topological metasurfaces, including nonlinear topological metasurfaces and reconfigurable topological metasurfaces. After overviewing the topological metasurfaces in the classical regime, we show how the topological metasurfaces could provide a new platform for quantum information and quantum many-body physics. Finally, we conclude and describe some challenges and future directions of this fast-evolving field.