Researchers from ITMO, MIPT, and universities in Germany and Switzerland have successfully trapped hybrid light particles known as exciton-polaritons. The team utilized a femtosecond laser and a perovskite-based metasurface to overcome the Klein paradox, which typically prevents massless particles from being confined.
The experiment involved a perovskite film with a thickness one thousand times smaller than a human hair. By etching a microscopic pattern into the material, the scientists created an environment where light-matter interaction is maximized. A laser pulse creates an excited region where polaritons are generated and trapped, preventing them from escaping into the unexcited surrounding area.
Spectrometer analysis confirmed the confinement, showing that the trapped polaritons occupied distinct energy levels. This breakthrough is intended for the development of optical computing systems. Such processors could perform complex calculations, including vector-matrix multiplication for AI and large language models, at speeds hundreds of times faster than current electronics.
The project is supported by the Priority 2030 program. Future research aims to integrate these metasurfaces into diffractive neural networks. By placing multiple traps on a chip of approximately one square centimeter, the team expects to achieve significant improvements in energy efficiency and computational performance for tasks like pattern recognition and logistics optimization.
