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Observation of and modes in an acoustic Floquet system
Phys. Rev. B 114, 034207 – Published 16 July, 2026
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1103/k7y2-13x5
Abstract
It has been proposed that Floquet topological states can be used to generate period-doubled oscillations that break discrete time-translation symmetry. This behavior originates from topological modes—boundary states pinned at half the driving frequency. Although such oscillations resemble those in time crystals, the underlying mechanisms are different: the period-doubled Floquet edge states arise from a single-particle Hamiltonian and are protected by the space-time symmetries of the lattice. Recently, period-quadrupled oscillations have been realized in acoustic and photonic systems, governed by modes—boundary states pinned at one quarter of the driving frequency. These studies establish the sequence to , where is the driving period, and further generalizations within the same framework lead to , and other powers of two, rather than to or . In this work, we realize another set of edge states— and modes, with quasienergies pinned at and . Using designed acoustic waveguides, we observe - and -periodic responses from an initially localized boundary excitation, providing evidence for the existence of these states.