Vortices are widely studied in fields ranging from nonlinear optics to magnetic systems and superconductors. A vortex carries binary information corresponding to its topological charge, “plus” or “minus”, that can be used for information storage and processing. In spatially extended optical and condensed many-particle systems, achieving full control over vortex formation and its charge is particularly difficult and is not easily extended to systems of multiple vortices. Here we demonstrate the optical creation of multiplets of phase-locked vortices in polariton condensates using off-resonant excitation with ring-shaped pump beams. We find that the vorticity of one vortex can be controlled solely using the phase locking with other nearby vortices. Using this mechanism, we demonstrate how an existing vortex with a specific topological charge can be inverted to the oppositely charged state and how the charge state of one reference vortex can be copied to a neighboring vortex. This way we can optically encode any set of binary information onto a chain of vortices. We further show that this information can be modified later by using the possibility to address and manipulate each vortex in the chain individually.

• Received 24 March 2017
• Revised 16 May 2017

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevB.95.235301