Transport properties in the photonic super-honeycomb lattice - a hybrid fermionic and bosonic system

Abstract

We report on transport properties of the super-honeycomb lattice, the band structure of which possesses a flat band and Dirac cones, according to the tight-binding approximation. This super-honeycomb model combines the honeycomb lattice and the Lieb lattice and displays the properties of both. The super-honeycomb lattice also represents a hybrid fermionic and bosonic system, which is rarely seen in nature. By choosing the phases of input beams properly, the flat-band mode of the super-honeycomb will be excited and the input beams will exhibit strong localization during propagation. On the other hand, if the modes of Dirac cones of the super-honeycomb lattice are excited, one will observe conical diffraction. Furthermore, if the input beam is properly chosen to excite a sublattice of the super-honeycomb lattice and the modes of Dirac cones with different pseudospins, e.g., the three-beam interference pattern, the pseudospin-mediated vortices will be observed.