Research Article Vol. 28, No. 26 / 21 December 2020 / Optics Express 38698 Coherent transfer of topological interface states P. COMARON,1,* V. SHAHNAZARYAN,1,2 AND M.MATUSZEWSKI1 1Institute of Physics, Polish Academy of Sciences, Al. Lotnikow 32/46, 02-668 Warsaw, Poland 2ITMO University, St. Petersburg 197101, Russia *
[email protected] Abstract: We demonstrate the controlled coherent transfer of topological interface states in a one-dimensional non-Hermitian chain of interacting Bose-Einstein condensates. The topological protection stems from a spatially patterned pump in an open-dissipative system. As a test bed setup of the proposed phenomenon, we consider a chain of coupled micropillars with embedded quantum wells, possessing exciton-polariton resonances. The transfer of an interface state is driven by spatially localised, adiabatic pump modulation in the vicinity of the interface state. The stochastic calculations prove the coherent nature of the interface state transfer. For appropriate system parameters the coherence degree is preserved after multiple transitions, paving the way towards long-range transfer of a coherent quantum state. © 2020 Optical Society of America under the terms of the OSA Open Access Publishing Agreement 1. Introduction Topological insulators (TI) are a class of materials that possess an energy bandgap and topologically protected low energy states [1,2]. Topological protection in these systems stems from the symmetry of the bulk, which is quantified by means of topological invariants. Bulk-boundary correspondence results in the protection of edge states, which hold promise for applications in dissipation-less communications and quantum computing. While in standard TIs non-trivial topology results from the properties of a Hermitian Hamilto- nian, recently a class of non-Hermitian topological systems attracted great interest [3].