Ray–Wave Correspondence in Microstar Cavities

In a previous work published by the authors in 2020, a novel concept of light confinement in a microcavity was introduced which is based on successive perfect transmissions at Brewster’s angle. Hence, a new class of open billiards was designed with star-shaped microcavities where rays propagate on orbits that leave and re-enter the cavity. In this article, we investigate the ray–wave correspondence in microstar cavities. An unintuitive difference between clockwise and counterclockwise propagation is revealed which is traced back to nonlinear resonance chains in phase space.