A 1D photonic crystal is created with strong polarization dependence and tunable by an applied electric field. This is accomplished in a planar microcavity by embedding a cholesteric liquid crystal (LC), which spontaneously forms a uniform lying helix (ULH). The applied voltage controls the orientation of the LC molecules and, consequently, the strength of a polarization‐dependent periodic potential. It leads to opening or closing of photonic bandgaps in the dispersion of the massive photons in the microcavity. In addition, when the ULH structure possesses a molecular tilt, it induces a spin‐orbit coupling between the lattice bands of different parity. This interband spin‐orbit coupling (ISOC) is analogous to optical activity and can be treated as a synthetic non‐Abelian gauge potential. Finally, it is showed that doping the LC with dyes allows us to achieve lasing that inherits all the above‐mentioned tunable properties of LC microcavity, including dual and circularly‐polarized lasing.

中文翻译：

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液晶微腔中的电可调自旋轨道耦合光子晶格


一维光子晶体具有很强的偏振依赖性，并可通过施加的电场进行调整。这是通过嵌入胆甾液液晶 （LC） 在平面微腔中实现的，该液晶会自发形成均匀螺旋 （ULH）。施加的电压控制 LC 分子的方向，从而控制偏振依赖性周期电位的强度。它导致大质量光子在微腔中色散时光子带隙的打开或关闭。此外，当 ULH 结构具有分子倾斜时，它会在不同奇偶性的晶格带之间诱导自旋-轨道耦合。这种带间自旋-轨道耦合 （ISOC） 类似于光学活动，可以被视为合成的非阿贝尔规范电位。最后，结果表明，用染料掺杂 LC 可以让我们实现继承 LC 微腔上述所有可调特性的激光，包括双极化和圆极化激光。