Photonic lattice of coupled microcavities in nonpermanent gravitational field produced by rotation

Rotation-induced splitting of the otherwise degenerate photonic bands is predicted for a two-dimensional photonic crystal made of evanescently coupled microcavities. The symmetry-broken energy splitting is similar to the Zeeman splitting of atomic levels or electron's (hole's) magnetic moment sublevels in an external magnetic field. The orbital motion of photons in periodic photonic lattice of microcavities is shown to enhance significantly such Coriolis-Zeeman splitting as compared to a solitary microcavity [11]. The equation of motion suggests that nonstationary rotation induces quantum transitions between photonic states and, furthermore, that such transitions might be used as a source for high-frequency gravitational waves.