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Time crystals (TCs) are many-body systems displaying spontaneous breaking of time translation symmetry. Here, we demonstrate a TC using driven-dissipative condensates of microcavity exciton-polaritons, spontaneously formed from an incoherent particle bath. In contrast to other realizations, the TC phases can be controlled by the power of continuous-wave non-resonant optical drive exciting the condensate and optomechanical interactions with phonons. Those phases are for increasing power: (i) Larmor precession of pseudo-spins - a signature of continuous TC, (ii) locking of the frequency of precession to self-sustained coherent phonons - stabilized TC, (iii) doubling of TC frequency by phonons - a discrete TC with continuous excitation. These results establish microcavity polaritons as a platform for the investigation of time-broken symmetry in non-hermitian systems., Comment: 25 pages; 15 figures

Electronic resonances can significantly enhance the photon-phonon coupling in cavity optomechanics, but are normally avoided due to absorption losses and dephasing by inhomogeneous broadening. We experimentally demonstrate that exciton-polaritons in semiconductor microcavities enable GHz optomechanics with single-particle resonant couplings reaching record values in the 10s of MHz range. Moreover, this resonant enhancement is protected from inhomogeneous broadening by the Rabi gap. Single-polariton non-linearities and the optomechanical strong-coupling regime become accessible in this platform., Comment: 13 pages, 12 figures

Optomechanical systems provide a pathway for the bidirectional optical-to-microwave interconversion in (quantum) networks. We demonstrate the implementation of this functionality and non-adiabatic optomechanical control in a single, $\mu$m-sized potential trap for phonons and exciton-polariton condensates in a structured semiconductor microcavity. The exciton-enhanced optomechanical coupling leads to self-oscillations (phonon lasing) -- thus proving reversible photon-to-phonon conversion. We show that these oscillations are a signature of the optomechanical strong coupling signalizing the emergence of elusive phonon-exciton-photon quasiparticles -- the phonoritons. We then demonstrate full control of the phonoriton spectrum as well as coherent microwave-to-photon interconversion using electrically generated GHz-vibrations and a resonant optical laser beam. These findings establish the zero-dimensional polariton condensates as a scalable coherent interface between microwave and optical domains with enhanced microwave-to-mechanical and mechanical-to-optical coupling rates.

Two-photon coherent states are one of the main building pillars of non-linear and quantum optics. It is the basis for the generation of minimum-uncertainty quantum states and entangled photon pairs, applications not obtainable from standard coherent states or one-photon lasers. Here we describe a fully-resonant optomechanical parametric amplifier involving a polariton condensate in a trap lattice quadratically coupled to mechanical modes. The quadratic coupling derives from non-resonant virtual transitions to extended discrete excited states induced by the optomechanical coupling. Non-resonant continuous wave (cw) laser excitation leads to striking experimental consequences, including the emergence of optomechanically induced inter-site parametric oscillations and inter-site tunneling of polaritons at discrete inter-trap detunings corresponding to sums of energies of the two involved mechanical oscillations (20 and 60 GHz confined vibrations). We show that the coherent mechanical oscillations correspond to parametric resonances with threshold condition different to that of standard linear optomechanical self-oscillation. The associated Arnold tongues display a complex scenario of states within the instability region. The observed new phenomena can have applications for the generation of entangled phonon pairs, squeezed mechanical states relevant in sensing and quantum computation, and for the bidirectional frequency conversion of signals in a technologically relevant range., Comment: 13 pages, 3 figures

Phonons, the quanta of vibrations, are very important for the equilibrium and dynamical properties of matter. GHz coherent phonons can also interact with and act as interconnects in a wide range of quantum systems. Harnessing and tailoring their coupling to opto-electronic excitations thus becomes highly relevant for engineered materials for quantum technologies. With this perspective we introduce polaromechanical metamaterials, two-dimensional arrays of $\mu$m-size zero-dimensional traps confining light-matter polariton fluids and GHz phonons. A strong exciton-mediated polariton-phonon interaction determines the inter-site polariton coupling with remarkable consequences for the dynamics. When locally perturbed by optical excitation, polaritons respond by locking the energy detuning between neighbor sites at integer multiples of the phonon energy, evidencing synchronization involving the polariton and phonon fields. These results open the path for the coherent control of quantum light fluids with hypersound in a scalable platform., Comment: 31 pages, 19 figures

Quantum communication networks require on-chip transfer and manipulation of single particles as well as their interconversion to single photons for long-range information exchange. Flying excitons propelled by GHz surface acoustic waves (SAWs) are outstanding messengers to fulfill these requirements. Here, we demonstrate the acoustic manipulation of single exciton centers consisting of individual excitons bound to shallow impurities centers embedded in a semiconductor quantum well. Time-resolved photoluminescence studies show that the emission intensity and energy from these centers oscillate at the SAW frequency of 3.5 GHz. Furthermore, these centers can be remotely pumped via acoustic transport of flying excitons along a quantum well channel over several microns. Time correlation studies reveal that the centers emit anti-bunched light, thus acting as single-photon sources operating at GHz frequencies. Our results pave the way for the exciton-based on-demand manipulation and on-chip transfer of single excitons at microwave frequencies with a natural photonic interface., Comment: Main text: 20 pages, 5 figures. Supporting Information: 5 pages, 4 figures

We report the experimental study of a hybrid quantum solid state system comprising two-level artificial atoms coupled to cavity confined optical and vibrational modes. In this system combining cavity quantum electrodynamics and cavity optomechanics, excitons in quantum wells play the role of the two-level atoms and are strongly coupled to the optical field leading to mixed polariton states. The planar optical microcavities are laterally microstructured, so that polaritons can be confined in wires, 3D traps, and arrays of traps, providing an additional tuning degree of freedom for the polariton energies. Upon increasing the non-resonant laser excitation power, a Bose-Einstein condensation of the polaritons is observed. Optomechanical induced amplification type of experiments with an additional weak laser probe clearly identify the coupling of these Bose-Einstein condensates to 20~GHz breathing-like vibrations confined in the same cavities. With single continuous wave non-resonant laser excitation, and once the laser power overpasses the threshold for Bose-Einstein condensation in trap arrays, mechanical self-oscillation similar to phonon ``lasing'' is induced with the concomitant observation of Mollow-triplet type mechanical sidebands on the Bose-Einstein condensate emission. High-resolution spectroscopic photoluminescence experiments evidence that these vibrational side-band resolved lines are enhanced when neighboring traps are red-detuned with respect to the BEC emission at overtones of the fundamental 20 GHz breathing mode frequency. These results constitute the first demonstration of coherent cavity polariton optomechanics and pave the way towards a novel type of hybrid devices for quantum technologies, phonon lasers, and phonon-photon bidirectional translators., Comment: 16 pages, 11 figures

We report on the selective excitation of single impurity-bound exciton states in a GaAs double quantum well (DQW). The structure consists of two quantum wells (QWs) coupled by a thin tunnel barrier. The DQW is subject to a transverse electric field to create spatially indirect inter-QW excitons with electrons and holes located in different QWs. We show that the presence of intra-QW charged excitons (trions) blocks carrier tunneling across the barrier to form indirect excitons, thus opening a gap in their emission spectrum. This behavior is attributed to the low binding energy of the trions. Within the tunneling blockade regime, emission becomes dominated by processes involving excitons bound to single shallow impurities, which behave as two-level centers activated by resonant tunneling. The quantum nature of the emission is confirmed by the anti-bunched photon emission statistics. The narrow distribution of emission energies ($\sim 10$~meV) and the electrical connection to the QWs make these single-exciton centers interesting candidates for applications in single-photon sources., Comment: 5 pages, 5 figures plus supplementary materials

Semiconductor microcavities operating in the polaritonic regime are highly non-linear, high speed systems due to the unique half-light, half-matter nature of polaritons. Here, we report for the first time the observation of propagating multi-soliton polariton patterns consisting of multi-peak structures either along (x) or perpendicular to (y) the direction of propagation. Soliton arrays of up to 5 solitons are observed, with the number of solitons controlled by the size or power of the triggering laser pulse. The break-up along the x direction occurs due to interplay of bistability, negative effective mass and polariton-polariton scattering, while in the y direction the break-up results from nonlinear phase-dependent interactions of propagating fronts. We show the experimental results are in good agreement with numerical modelling. Our observations are a step towards ultrafast all-optical signal processing using sequences of solitons as bits of information.

We describe a two-color pump-probe scanning magneto-optical Kerr effect (MOKE) microscope which we have developed to investigate electron spin phenomena in semiconductors at cryogenic temperatures with picosecond time and micrometer spatial resolution. The key innovation of our microscope is the usage of an ultrafast `white light' supercontinuum fiber-laser source which provides access to the whole visible and near-infrared spectral range. Our Kerr microscope allows for the independent selection of the excitation and detection energy while avoiding the necessity to synchronize the pulse trains of two separate picosecond laser systems. The ability to independently tune the pump and probe wavelength enables the investigation of the influence of excitation energy on the optically induced electron spin dynamics in semiconductors. We demonstrate picosecond real-space imaging of the diffusive expansion of optically excited electron spin packets in a (110) GaAs quantum well sample to illustrate the capabilities of the instrument., Comment: 10 pages, 4 figures

We demonstrate the creation of vortices in a macroscopically occupied polariton state formed in a semiconductor microcavity. A weak external laser beam carrying orbital angular momentum (OAM) is used to imprint a vortex on the condensate arising from the polariton optical parametric oscillator (OPO). The vortex core radius is found to decrease with increasing pump power, and is determined by polariton-polariton interactions. As a result of OAM conservation in the parametric scattering process, the excitation consists of a vortex in the signal and a corresponding anti-vortex in the idler of the OPO. The experimental results are in good agreement with a theoretical model of a vortex in the polariton OPO., Comment: 3 figures

We report on the spin properties of bright polariton solitons supported by an external pump to compensate losses. We observe robust circularly polarised solitons when a circularly polarised pump is applied, a result attributed to phase synchronisation between nondegenerate TE and TM polarised polariton modes at high momenta. For the case of a linearly polarised pump either s+ or s- circularly polarised bright solitons can be switched on in a controlled way by a s+ or s- writing beam respectively. This feature arises directly from the widely differing interaction strengths between co- and cross-circularly polarised polaritons. In the case of orthogonally linearly polarised pump and writing beams, the soliton emission on average is found to be unpolarised, suggesting strong spatial evolution of the soliton polarisation, a conclusion supported by polarisation correlation measurements. The observed results are in agreement with theory, which predicts stable circularly polarised solitons and unstable linearly polarised solitons resulting in spatial evolution of their polarisation., Comment: 5 pages