Science Daily  January 10, 2023 Topological states enable robust transport within disorder-rich media. However, to exploit topological protection in a length-scalable platform such as optical fiber remains a challenge. Through modeling and experiment a team of researchers in the UK demonstrated that optical fiber hosts topological supermodes across multiple light-guiding cores. They directly measured the photonic winding number invariant characterizing the bulk and observed topological guidance of visible light over meter length scales. The mechanical flexibility of fiber allowed them to reversibly reconfigure the topological state. As the fiber was bent, they found that the edge states first lost their […]