Excitonic Floquet Engineering: A New Frontier in Materials Science

Imagine a world where materials can be engineered to exhibit exotic quantum properties, opening up new possibilities for technological advancements. Welcome to the world of excitonic Floquet engineering.

TL;DR
• Scientists at OIST and Stanford University have demonstrated a new approach to Floquet engineering using excitons.
• This breakthrough could revolutionize materials science and quantum research.
• Excitonic Floquet engineering has the potential to open up new possibilities for technological advancements.

Summary
Researchers at the Okinawa Institute of Science and Technology (OIST) and Stanford University have demonstrated a new approach to Floquet engineering using excitons rather than photons. This approach aims to modify a material's quantum states by using excitons, which are quasiparticles formed in semiconductors when electrons are excited from their valence band to a higher energy level.

The use of excitons allows for much stronger coupling with the material than light, requiring lower intensities. This method involves exciting a semiconductor with a light drive, then measuring the energy levels of electrons after dialing down the optical drive.

Key insights include:
• The discovery opens up a wide range of excitation options, such as phonons, plasmons, and magnons.
• Excitonic Floquet engineering requires much lower intensities than traditional light-driven methods.
• The researchers observed Floquet replicas with excitons much more easily than with light.

The findings, published in Nature Physics, show that excitons can be used to extract Floquet effects, offering a new pathway for modifying material properties. This method could potentially be used to imbue exotic quantum properties into ordinary materials.

The research team used a time- and angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy (TR-ARPES) setup at OIST to investigate the effects of excitons on material properties. By using excitons, the team was able to achieve a much stronger effect with less data acquisition time compared to traditional light-driven methods.

As we continue to push the boundaries of quantum research, it's exciting to think about the potential applications of excitonic Floquet engineering. What new technologies will emerge from this discovery?