We develop a theory of cavity quantum electrodynamics for a 2D electron gas in the presence of Rashba spin-orbit coupling and perpendicular static magnetic field, coupled to spatially nonuniform multimode quantum cavity photon field. We demonstrate that the lowest polaritonic frequency of the full Hamiltonian can vanish for realistic parameters, achieving the Dicke superradiant quantum phase transition. This singular behavior originates from soft spin-flip transitions possessing a nonvanishing dipole moment at nonzero wave vectors and can be viewed as a static paramagnetic instability.

• Received 18 July 2019
• Revised 11 September 2019

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevLett.123.207402