title: Observation of backscattering-immune chiral electromagnetic modes without time reversal breaking.
abstract: A strategy is proposed to realize robust transport in a time reversal invariant photonic system. Using numerical simulation and a microwave experiment, we demonstrate that a chiral guided mode in the channel of a three-dimensional dielectric layer-by-layer photonic crystal is immune to the scattering of a square patch of metal or dielectric inserted to block the channel. The chirality based robust transport can be realized in nonmagnetic dielectric materials without any external field.
authors.affiliation: State Key Laboratory of Optoelectronic Materials and Technologies, Sun Yat-Sen (Zhongshan) University, Guangzhou 510275, China.
authors.forename: Wen-Jie
authors.initials: WJ
authors.lastname: Chen
authors.forename: Zhi Hong
authors.initials: ZH
authors.lastname: Hang
authors.forename: Jian-Wen
authors.initials: JW
authors.lastname: Dong
authors.forename: Xiao
authors.initials: X
authors.lastname: Xiao
authors.forename: He-Zhou
authors.initials: HZ
authors.lastname: Wang
authors.forename: C T
authors.initials: CT
authors.lastname: Chan