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arXiv · 2510.19558

Unveiling chiral electron-photon correlation effects in circularly polarized optical devices

Yassir El Moutaoukal·Rosario R. Riso·Andrea Bianchi·Henrik Koch
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Abstract

Strong coupling with circularly polarized vacuum fluctuations offers a viable route to manipulate molecular chirality. While experiments are advancing toward the realization of chiral cavities, a mean-field theoretical framework for describing electron-photon interaction in this platform has been missing. Here, we present a mean-field theory that can be systematically improved to capture the chiral correlation effects responsible for the enantioselective power of chiral light. We use strong coupling M{\o}ller-Plesset perturbation theory for accessing the excitation manifold of electrons and chiral virtual photons. We apply the developed methods to selected chiral systems and show that the mean-field theory captures cavity frequency dispersion, but fails to describe the chiral discrimination arising from coupled electron-photon excitations.

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Yassir El Moutaoukal, Rosario R. Riso, Andrea Bianchi, Henrik Koch. 2025-10-22. Unveiling chiral electron-photon correlation effects in circularly polarized optical devices. https://arxiv.org/abs/2510.19558

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