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Bound, antibound, and resonance two-photon states in chiral waveguide QED

Jiaming Shi and Alexander Poddubny*

  • *Contact author: poddubny@weizmann.ac.il

Phys. Rev. A 114, 023732 – Published 28 August, 2026

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1103/dhdw-m239

Abstract

We present a theoretical study of the two-particle spectrum ω(K) for the chiral waveguide QED setup of an array of two-level atoms directionally interacting with photons propagating along the waveguide. We demonstrate that for each pair center-of-mass momentum K there exist distinct solutions with Imω0 in the two-particle spectrum, corresponding to bound, antibound, and resonance states, in addition to the continuum of scattering states. Contrary to previous studies, which showed the bound and resonance-state spectra only over a limited range of K, the calculated spectrum is consistent across all K values. An interesting finding is that the real part of the spectrum Reω(K) in the chiral model is gapless. The calculated dispersion law ω(K) provides an effective model for the bound photon pairs also in a finite-size array, manifesting the topological non-Hermitian skin effect.

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