Localized phonon-polaritons in natural mineral particles extend to atmospheric scales
Abstract
Localized phonon-polaritons confine electromagnetic fields to subwavelength dimensions and are widely studied in engineered photonic structures. Whether this light-matter physics can arise intrinsically in naturally occurring, free-standing solid particles has remained unexplored. Here we show that mineral aerosols provide a natural realization of localized phonon-polaritons, strongly modifying their long-wavelength optical response. Airborne calcite particles display a pronounced extinction resonance at 3.4 THz that is absent in similarly sized quartz particles, demonstrating that particle geometry alone cannot account for the observed response. Mie theory and anisotropic full-wave simulations identify the resonance as a hybridization between a dipolar Mie mode and the strongly dispersive lattice response of calcite, with its frequency shifted by the non-spherical morphology of the particles. Crucially, this microscopic light-matter interaction extends to the atmospheric scale: radiative-transfer calculations show that calcite's polaritonic response contributes up to 1.1 W m⁻² to outgoing longwave radiation under dust-rich conditions near desert source regions, a magnitude comparable to radiative effects reported for major regional dust events. These results establish naturally occurring mineral particles as a new class of localized polaritonic systems, demonstrating that polaritonic photonics is not confined to engineered structures.
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BibTeX
@misc{bichon2026localized,
title = {{Localized phonon-polaritons in natural mineral particles extend to atmospheric scales}},
author = {Jeyan Bichon and Hervé Herbin and J-F Lampin and D Petitprez and Romain Peretti and S Eliet-Barois},
howpublished = {HAL},
year = {2026},
month = oct,
url = {https://hal.science/hal-05796051v1},
note = {CC BY-NC-ND 4.0},
}
RIS
TY - UNPB
TI - Localized phonon-polaritons in natural mineral particles extend to atmospheric scales
AU - Jeyan Bichon
AU - Hervé Herbin
AU - J-F Lampin
AU - D Petitprez
AU - Romain Peretti
AU - S Eliet-Barois
PY - 2026
DA - 2026/10/08
PB - HAL
UR - https://hal.science/hal-05796051v1
AB - Localized phonon-polaritons confine electromagnetic fields to subwavelength dimensions and are widely studied in engineered photonic structures. Whether this light-matter physics can arise intrinsically in naturally occurring, free-standing solid particles has remained unexplored. Here we show that mineral aerosols provide a natural realization of localized phonon-polaritons, strongly modifying their long-wavelength optical response. Airborne calcite particles display a pronounced extinction resonance at 3.4 THz that is absent in similarly sized quartz particles, demonstrating that particle geometry alone cannot account for the observed response. Mie theory and anisotropic full-wave simulations identify the resonance as a hybridization between a dipolar Mie mode and the strongly dispersive lattice response of calcite, with its frequency shifted by the non-spherical morphology of the particles. Crucially, this microscopic light-matter interaction extends to the atmospheric scale: radiative-transfer calculations show that calcite's polaritonic response contributes up to 1.1 W m⁻² to outgoing longwave radiation under dust-rich conditions near desert source regions, a magnitude comparable to radiative effects reported for major regional dust events. These results establish naturally occurring mineral particles as a new class of localized polaritonic systems, demonstrating that polaritonic photonics is not confined to engineered structures.
ER -