Chiral Light in Helically Twisted Photonic Lattices

Abstract

The propagation of chiral light in optically induced helical photonic waveguide arrays is investigated. Manifested in their chiral interaction, the system's selectivity to optical orbital angular momentum is demonstrated. In order to realize twisted refractive index waveguide arrays, 3D modulated light fields are tailored to nonlinearly inscribe these helical waveguides in photosensitive material. Additionally, it is shown that this functional system provides controllable output states by optically changing the waveguides' potential depths or the nonlinearity's sign.