Observation of Non-Hermitian Edge Burst in Quantum Dynamics

The non-Hermitian skin effect, by which the eigenstates of the Hamiltonian are predominantly localized at the boundary, has revealed a strong sensitivity of non-Hermitian systems to the boundary condition. Here we experimentally observe a striking boundary-induced dynamical phenomenon known as the non-Hermitian edge burst, which is characterized by a sharp boundary accumulation of loss in non-Hermitian time evolutions. In contrast to the eigenstate localization, the edge burst represents a generic non-Hermitian dynamical phenomenon that occurs in real time. Our experiment, based on photonic quantum walks, not only confirms the prediction of the phenomenon, but also unveils its complete space-time dynamics. Our observation of edge burst paves the way for studying the rich real-time dynamics in non-Hermitian topological systems.