Molecules in a Quantum-Optical Flask

When confined to small dimensions, the interaction between light and matter can be enhanced up to the point where it overcomes all the incoherent, dissipative processes. In this "strong coupling" regime the photons and the material start to behave as a single entity, having its own quantum states and energy levels.

In this talk I will discuss how such cavity-QED effects can be used in order to control material properties and molecular processes. This includes, for example, modifying photochemical reactions [1], enhancing excitonic transport up to ballistic motion close to the light-speed [2-3] and potentially tailoring the mesoscopic properties of crystals, by hybridizing the vibrational modes of the material with electromagnetic THz fields [4-5].

1.    J. A. Hutchison, T. Schwartz, C. Genet, E. Devaux, and T. W. Ebbesen, "Modifying Chemical Landscapes by Coupling to Vacuum Fields," Angew. Chemie Int. Ed. 51, 1592 (2012).
2.    G. G. Rozenman, K. Akulov, A. Golombek, and T. Schwartz, "Long-Range Transport of Organic Exciton-Polaritons Revealed by Ultrafast Microscopy," ACS Photonics 5, 105 (2018).
3.    M. Balasubrahmaniyam, A. Simkovich, A. Golombek, G. Sandik, G. Ankonina, and T. Schwartz, "From enhanced diffusion to ultrafast ballistic motion of hybrid light–matter excitations," Nat. Mater., DOI 10.1038/s41563-022-01463-3 (2023).
4.    R. Damari, O. Weinberg, D. Krotkov, N. Demina, K. Akulov, A. Golombek, T. Schwartz, and S. Fleischer, "Strong coupling of collective intermolecular vibrations in organic materials at terahertz frequencies," Nat. Commun. 10, 3248 (2019).
5.    M. Kaeek, R. Damari, M. Roth, S. Fleischer, and T. Schwartz, "Strong Coupling in a Self-Coupled Terahertz Photonic Crystal," ACS Photonics 8, 1881 (2021).