Tailoring chaotic motion of microcavity photons in ray and wave dynamics by tuning the curvature of space

TL;DR

This paper investigates how varying space curvature influences the transition between regular and chaotic photon dynamics in microcavities, revealing unique effects due to the interplay of chaos, wave behavior, and non-Euclidean geometry.

Contribution

It demonstrates the impact of space curvature on photon motion, highlighting mechanisms like diffusion, localization, and hybridization in chaotic regimes, and introduces a versatile optical simulator for quantum chaos in curved space.

Findings

Regular modes form island structures in phase space.

Chaotic modes exhibit rapid diffusion and wavepacket localization.

The system serves as a simulator for quantum chaos in curved spacetime.

Abstract

Microcavity photon dynamics in curved space is an emerging interesting area at the crossing point of nanophotonics, chaotic science and non-Euclidean geometry. We report the sharp difference between the regular and chaotic motions of cavity photons subjected to the varying space curvature. While the island modes of regular motion rise in the phase diagram in the curved space, the chaotic modes show special mechanisms to adapt to the space curvature, including the fast diffusion of ray dynamics, and the localization and hybridization of the Husimi wavepackets among different periodic orbits. These obser-vations are unique effects enabled by the combination of the chaotic trajectory, the wave nature of light and the non-Euclidean orbital motion, and therefore make the system a versatile optical simulator for chaotic science under quan-tum mechanics in curved space-time.