Valley-Hall-like second-order photonic topological insulators in Kagome lattice

Abstract: Valley-Hall-like second-order photonic topological insulators are designed in Kagome-lattice photonic crystals with C3v point-group symmetry. The photonic crystal consists of circular air holes in pure dielectric materials. Different from conventional valley-Hall photonic topological insulators characterized by valley Chern numbers, the proposed insulators have topological invariants described by quantized electric polarization. Topological transition can be realized by tuning the structural size and topological edge states appear at the interface between photonic crystals with different topological phases, preserving important features of valley-Hall photonic insulators such as valley transport with little backscattering. The proposed photonic crystal also support zero-dimensional corner states in oblique corners, showing its second-order topological insulator signature. This work presents the possibility to realize topologically protected reflection suppressed waveguides and local cavities in the same platform.