Exceptional points in anisotropic planar microcavities

Abstract

Planar microcavities allow the control and manipulation of spin polarization, manifested in phenomena like the optical spin Hall effect due to the intrinsic polarization mode splitting. Here, we study a transparent microcavity with broken rotational symmetry, realized by aligning the optic axis of a uniaxial cavity material in the cavity plane, giving rise to exceptional points in the dispersion relation. These occur pairwise, are circularly polarized, and are cores of polarization vortices. The exceptional points are result of the non-Hermitian character of the system and are in close relationship to singular optic axes in absorptive biaxial systems.