Physical Chemistry Seminar: Synthetic magnetism in nonlinear optics

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Abstract:

Nonlinear frequency mixing of optical waves can emulate spin currents in magnetic materials: The signal and idler complex amplitudes represent the two-dimensional spin vector, and the nonlinear coupling represents the material magnetization. 

This analogy is used to observe new nonlinear optical effects and devices that can split, route and guide the signal and idler according to the relative phase between these two beams. These effects include the all-optical Stern-Gerlach effect [1], the topological Hall effect in skyrmions [2] and Anderson localization of spin currents in disordered spin glass [3]. 

Moreover, it enables to realize new optical devices, including spin valve - a spin-dependent beam splitter that can split signal-idler beam according to the relative phase between them [4] and spin waveguide that can guide in-phase only signal-idler beams [5].

[1] O. Yesharim et al, Nature Photonics 16, 582 (2022);

[2] A. Karnieli, S. Tsesses, G. Bartal and A. Arie, Nature Comm. 12, 1092 (2021);

[3] S. Izhak et al, Phys. Rev. Lett. 134, 123803 (2025);

[4] S. Izhak et al, Opt. Lett. 49, 1025 (2024);

[5] O. Yesharim, S. Izhak and A. Arie, Nature Comm. 16, 6508 (2025)

Seminar Organizer: Prof. Yuval Ebenstein