Scalable higher-order exceptional surface with passive resonators

Abstract: The sensitivity of perturbation sensing can be effectively enhanced with higher-order exceptional points due to the nonlinear response to frequency splitting. However, the experimental implementation is challenging since all the parameters need to be precisely prepared. The emergence of exceptional surface (ES) improves the robustness of the system to the external environment, while maintaining the same sensitivity. Here, we propose the first scalable protocol for realizing photonic high-order exceptional surface with passive resonators. By adding one or more additional passive resonators in the low-order ES photonic system, the 3- or arbitrary N-order ES is constructed and proved to be easily realized in experiment. We show that the sensitivity is enhanced and experimental demonstration is more resilent against the fabrication errors. The additional phase-modulation effect is also investigated.