Freespace twistronics for optical supertopologies

Freespace twistronics for optical supertopologies | Research Square window.SnipcartSettings = { analytics: { enabled: false } }; (function() { var accessVector = localStorage.getItem('access_vector') || ''; window.dataLayer = window.dataLayer || []; if (accessVector) { window.dataLayer.push({ user: { profile: { profileInfo: { snid: accessVector } } } }); } })(); (function(w,d,s,l,i){w[l]=w[l]||[];w[l].push({'gtm.start':new Date().getTime(),event:'gtm.js'});var f=d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0],j=d.createElement(s),dl=l!='dataLayer'?'&l='+l:'';j.async=true;j.src='https://www.googletagmanager.com/gtm.js?id='+i+dl;f.parentNode.insertBefore(j,f);})(window,document,'script','dataLayer','GTM-K279D39R'); Browse Preprints In Review Journals COVID-19 Preprints AJE Video Bytes Research Tools Research Promotion AJE Professional Editing AJE Rubriq About Preprint Platform In Review Editorial Policies Our Team Advisory Board Help Center Sign In Submit a Preprint Cite Share Download PDF Article Freespace twistronics for optical supertopologies Yijie Shen, Vasu Dev This is a preprint; it has not been peer reviewed by a journal. https://doi.org/ 10.21203/rs.3.rs-8188826/v1 This work is licensed under a CC BY 4.0 License Status: Under Review Version 1 posted 11 You are reading this latest preprint version Abstract Twistronics, the study of moiré superlattices of twisted bilayer 2D materials creating nontrivial physical effects, has recently revolutionized diverse subjects from materials to optoelectronics, nanophotonics, and beyond. Here, breaking the reliance on materials, we present twistronics in higher-dimensional free space, where the twisted lattice is not a layer of 2D material but a 3D propagating light field with topological textures. Moiré structured light with a twist angle can generate a rich set of high-dimensional topologies, including skyrmionium bags, skyrmion bag superlattices, skyrmion clusters, and quasicrystals, with controllable symmetry. Many of these textures have not been reported before. Importantly, in contrast to prior moiré superlattices, our freespace moiré textures maintain their topologies over long propagation distances, showing nondiffractive behavior and robustness against perturbations and obstacles. Our work unlocks higher dimensions to manipulate moiré photonics with high-capacity topologies to address the challenges of robust information transfer and encryption. Physical sciences/Optics and photonics/Applied optics/Adaptive optics Physical sciences/Optics and photonics/Optical techniques/Optical manipulation and tweezers Full Text Additional Declarations There is NO Competing Interest. Supplementary Files SM.pdf Supplementary Material Cite Share Download PDF Status: Under Review Version 1 posted Unknown event 30 Mar, 2026 Editorial decision: Reject after peer review 11 Mar, 2026 Review # 3 received at journal 10 Mar, 2026 Reviewer # 3 agreed at journal 10 Feb, 2026 Review # 2 received at journal 03 Feb, 2026 Review # 1 received at journal 27 Jan, 2026 Reviewer # 2 agreed at journal 09 Jan, 2026 Reviewer # 1 agreed at journal 09 Jan, 2026 Reviewers invited by journal 09 Jan, 2026 Editor assigned by journal 24 Nov, 2025 First submitted to journal 23 Nov, 2025 You are reading this latest preprint version Research Square lets you share your work early, gain feedback from the community, and start making changes to your manuscript prior to peer review in a journal. As a division of Research Square Company, we’re committed to making research communication faster, fairer, and more useful. We do this by developing innovative software and high quality services for the global research community. Our growing team is made up of researchers and industry professionals working together to solve the most critical problems facing scientific publishing. Also discoverable on Platform About Our Team In Review Editorial Policies Advisory Board Help Center Resources Author Services Accessibility API Access RSS feed Manage Cookie Preferences © Research Square 2026 | ISSN 2693-5015 (online) Privacy Policy Terms of Service Do Not Sell My Personal Information {"props":{"pageProps":{"initialData":{"identity":"rs-8188826","acceptedTermsAndConditions":true,"allowDirectSubmit":false,"archivedVersions":[],"articleType":"Article","associatedPublications":[],"authors":[{"id":572063815,"identity":"c609defe-457c-4558-87ce-1902c143ac6a","order_by":0,"name":"Yijie Shen","email":"data:image/png;base64,iVBORw0KGgoAAAANSUhEUgAAAZAAAAAyAQMAAABI0h/eAAAABlBMVEX///8AAABVwtN+AAAACXBIWXMAAA7EAAAOxAGVKw4bAAAA9ElEQVRIiWNgGAWjYDACZoaEA0AqAcg6ABE5QLwWtgSIaoJaoACohceAOC0GxxkeHvjAUJfHL93z7fHHNgY5vhsJzB+/4NNymCHh4AyGw8WSc85uNzjYxmAseSOBTVqGgJbDPAwHEjfcyN0mAdQCZCSwMUsQ0vKHoS5x/42cZyAt9UAtzJ8JagGGW+IGiRw2kJYEgxsJDJIf8GiRBPmlx+Bw4owbaWYSZ85JGM4887BNGo8OBr7zZ5I//KioS+yfkfxMoqLMRp7vePLhjz/waFE4wJMAdB6cD/IEYwMzDx4t8g3sBzBFGfHZMgpGwSgYBSMOAAAEBlc8+x27ugAAAABJRU5ErkJggg==","orcid":"https://orcid.org/0000-0002-6700-9902","institution":"Nanyang Technological University","correspondingAuthor":true,"prefix":"","firstName":"Yijie","middleName":"","lastName":"Shen","suffix":""},{"id":572063816,"identity":"a9725658-6e7b-4ab9-9139-940696aaf7a0","order_by":1,"name":"Vasu Dev","email":"","orcid":"","institution":"Nanyang Technological University","correspondingAuthor":false,"prefix":"","firstName":"Vasu","middleName":"","lastName":"Dev","suffix":""}],"badges":[],"createdAt":"2025-11-24 03:26:03","currentVersionCode":1,"declarations":"","doi":"10.21203/rs.3.rs-8188826/v1","doiUrl":"https://doi.org/10.21203/rs.3.rs-8188826/v1","draftVersion":[],"editorialEvents":[],"editorialNote":"","failedWorkflow":false,"files":[{"id":104780253,"identity":"a7bcab09-c15f-4d34-bb53-43b704113fe1","added_by":"auto","created_at":"2026-03-17 07:51:46","extension":"pdf","order_by":1,"title":"","display":"","copyAsset":false,"role":"manuscript-pdf","size":6536173,"visible":true,"origin":"","legend":"Article File","description":"","filename":"FreespaceTwistronics.pdf","url":"https://assets-eu.researchsquare.com/files/rs-8188826/v1_covered_8cce866f-23fe-442f-9436-c856512dfcec.pdf"},{"id":100143204,"identity":"8c4f2657-a2d4-4983-bb1f-080d3fa263b9","added_by":"auto","created_at":"2026-01-13 12:01:37","extension":"pdf","order_by":1,"title":"","display":"","copyAsset":false,"role":"supplement","size":1065933,"visible":true,"origin":"","legend":"Supplementary Material","description":"","filename":"SM.pdf","url":"https://assets-eu.researchsquare.com/files/rs-8188826/v1/1d578c1be453e4f6af7467cc.pdf"}],"financialInterests":"There is \u003cb\u003eNO\u003c/b\u003e Competing Interest.","formattedTitle":"Freespace twistronics for optical supertopologies","fulltext":[],"fulltextSource":"","fullText":"","funders":[],"hasAdminPriorityOnWorkflow":false,"hasManuscriptDocX":false,"hasOptedInToPreprint":true,"hasPassedJournalQc":"","hasAnyPriority":true,"hideJournal":false,"highlight":"","institution":"","isAcceptedByJournal":false,"isAuthorSuppliedPdf":true,"isDeskRejected":"","isHiddenFromSearch":false,"isInQc":false,"isInWorkflow":false,"isPdf":true,"isPdfUpToDate":true,"isWithdrawnOrRetracted":false,"journal":{"display":true,"email":"[email protected]","identity":"light-science-and-applications","isNatureJournal":false,"hasQc":false,"allowDirectSubmit":false,"externalIdentity":"lsa","sideBox":"Learn more about [Light: Science \u0026 Applications](http://www.nature.com/lsa/)","snPcode":"41377","submissionUrl":"https://mts-lsa.nature.com/","title":"Light: Science \u0026 Applications","twitterHandle":"","acdcEnabled":true,"dfaEnabled":true,"editorialSystem":"ejp","reportingPortfolio":"Nature AJ","inReviewEnabled":true,"inReviewRevisionsEnabled":true},"keywords":"","lastPublishedDoi":"10.21203/rs.3.rs-8188826/v1","lastPublishedDoiUrl":"https://doi.org/10.21203/rs.3.rs-8188826/v1","license":{"name":"CC BY 4.0","url":"https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/"},"manuscriptAbstract":"Twistronics, the study of moiré superlattices of twisted bilayer 2D materials creating nontrivial physical effects, has recently revolutionized diverse subjects from materials to optoelectronics, nanophotonics, and beyond. Here, breaking the reliance on materials, we present twistronics in higher-dimensional free space, where the twisted lattice is not a layer of 2D material but a 3D propagating light field with topological textures. Moiré structured light with a twist angle can generate a rich set of high-dimensional topologies, including skyrmionium bags, skyrmion bag superlattices, skyrmion clusters, and quasicrystals, with controllable symmetry. Many of these textures have not been reported before. Importantly, in contrast to prior moiré superlattices, our freespace moiré textures maintain their topologies over long propagation distances, showing nondiffractive behavior and robustness against perturbations and obstacles. Our work unlocks higher dimensions to manipulate moiré photonics with high-capacity topologies to address the challenges of robust information transfer and encryption.","manuscriptTitle":"Freespace twistronics for optical supertopologies","msid":"","msnumber":"","nonDraftVersions":[{"code":1,"date":"2026-01-13 12:01:33","doi":"10.21203/rs.3.rs-8188826/v1","editorialEvents":[{"type":"communityComments","content":0},{"type":"transferred","content":"Light: Science \u0026 Applications","date":"2026-03-31T02:45:39+00:00","index":"","fulltext":""},{"type":"decision","content":"Reject after peer review","date":"2026-03-11T14:14:30+00:00","index":"","fulltext":""},{"type":"editorInvitedReview","content":"This content is not available.","date":"2026-03-10T12:57:04+00:00","index":3,"fulltext":"This content is not available."},{"type":"reviewerAgreed","content":"This content is not available.","date":"2026-02-11T02:59:10+00:00","index":3,"fulltext":"This content is not available."},{"type":"editorInvitedReview","content":"This content is not available.","date":"2026-02-03T09:20:46+00:00","index":2,"fulltext":"This content is not available."},{"type":"editorInvitedReview","content":"This content is not available.","date":"2026-01-27T08:47:55+00:00","index":1,"fulltext":"This content is not available."},{"type":"reviewerAgreed","content":"This content is not available.","date":"2026-01-09T19:33:06+00:00","index":2,"fulltext":"This content is not available."},{"type":"reviewerAgreed","content":"This content is not available.","date":"2026-01-09T12:54:07+00:00","index":1,"fulltext":"This content is not available."},{"type":"reviewersInvited","content":"","date":"2026-01-09T12:36:52+00:00","index":"","fulltext":""},{"type":"editorAssigned","content":"","date":"2025-11-24T10:52:45+00:00","index":"","fulltext":""},{"type":"submitted","content":"Nature Photonics","date":"2025-11-24T03:22:46+00:00","index":"","fulltext":""}],"status":"published","journal":{"display":true,"email":"[email protected]","identity":"light-science-and-applications","isNatureJournal":false,"hasQc":false,"allowDirectSubmit":false,"externalIdentity":"lsa","sideBox":"Learn more about [Light: Science \u0026 Applications](http://www.nature.com/lsa/)","snPcode":"41377","submissionUrl":"https://mts-lsa.nature.com/","title":"Light: Science \u0026 Applications","twitterHandle":"","acdcEnabled":true,"dfaEnabled":true,"editorialSystem":"ejp","reportingPortfolio":"Nature AJ","inReviewEnabled":true,"inReviewRevisionsEnabled":true}}],"origin":"","ownerIdentity":"7d91b805-f2be-4b09-b84f-bc8f9900e066","owner":[],"postedDate":"January 13th, 2026","published":true,"recentEditorialEvents":[],"rejectedJournal":[],"revision":"","amendment":"","status":"under-review","subjectAreas":[{"id":60879706,"name":"Physical sciences/Optics and photonics/Applied optics/Adaptive optics"},{"id":60879707,"name":"Physical sciences/Optics and photonics/Optical techniques/Optical manipulation and tweezers"}],"tags":[],"updatedAt":"2026-04-03T23:05:29+00:00","versionOfRecord":[],"versionCreatedAt":"2026-01-13 12:01:33","video":"","vorDoi":"","vorDoiUrl":"","workflowStages":[]},"version":"v1","identity":"rs-8188826","journalConfig":"researchsquare"},"__N_SSP":true},"page":"/article/[identity]/[[...version]]","query":{"redirect":"/article/rs-8188826","identity":"rs-8188826","version":["v1"]},"buildId":"XKTyCvWXoU3ODBz1xrDgd","isFallback":false,"isExperimentalCompile":false,"dynamicIds":[84888],"gssp":true,"scriptLoader":[]}