arXiv · 1311.0556
Photonic spin Hall effect in topological insulators
Abstract
In this paper we theoretically investigate the photonic spin Hall effect (SHE) of a Gaussian beam reflected from the interface between air and topological insulators (TIs). The photonic SHE is attributed to spin-orbit coupling and manifests itself as in-plane and transverse spin-dependent splitting. We reveal that the spin-orbit coupling effect in TIs can be routed by adjusting the axion angle variations. Unlike the transverse spin-dependent splitting, we find that the in-plane one is sensitive to the axion angle. It is shown that the polarization structure in magneto-optical Kerr effect is significantly altered due to the spin-dependent splitting in photonic SHE. We theoretically propose a weak measurement method to determine the strength of axion coupling by probing the in-plane splitting of photonic SHE.
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Xinxing Zhou, Jin Zhang, Xiaohui Ling, Shizhen Chen, Hailu Luo, Shuangchun Wen. 2013-11-04. Photonic spin Hall effect in topological insulators. https://doi.org/10.1103/physreva.88.053840
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