Phys.org November 16, 2022
The concept of photonic frequency-momentum (ω-q) dispersion has been extensively studied in artificial dielectric structures such as photonic crystals and metamaterials, but not in in natural materials at the atomistic level. Researchers at Purdue University have developed a Maxwell Hamiltonian theory of matter combined with the quantum theory of atomistic polarization to obtain the electrodynamic dispersion of natural materials interacting with the photon field. They applied this theory to silicon and discovered the existence of anomalous atomistic waves. These waves occur in the spectral region where propagating waves are conventionally forbidden in a macroscopic theory. According to the researchers their findings demonstrate that natural media can host a variety of yet to be discovered waves with subnanometer effective wavelengths in the picophotonics regime…read more. TECHNICAL ARTICLEÂ
Proposed experiment for verification of atomistic effects… Credit: Phys. Rev. Applied 18, 044065, 27 October 2022