Focusing of elliptically polarized Gaussian beams through an annular high numerical aperture

Based on the vectorial Debye theory,the focusing properties of the Gaussian beam through an annular high numerical aperture are studied numerically,including the intensity,the phase and the orbital angular momentum properties.Then the influence of certain parameters on the focusing properties is also investigated.It is shown that sub-wavelength elliptical light spots can be obtained.And there exists a vortex in the longitudinal component of the focused field even though the incident beam is Gaussian beam,indicating that the spin angular momentum of the elliptically polarized Gaussian beam is converted into the orbital angular momentum by the focusing.     

Angular momentum conversion of elliptically polarized beams focused by high numerical-aperture phase Fresnel zone plates

Based on the vectorial Debye theory, we investigate the tight focusing of elliptically polarized light beams by high numerical-aperture (NA) phase Fresnel zone plates (FZP). The conversion of the spin angular momentum (SAM) and the orbital angular momentum (OAM) in the tight focusing of the elliptically polarized beams is investigated in great detail. It is shown that the direction and magnitude of the OAM can be directly modulated by the input polarization, providing effective evidence that the SAM carried by an elliptically polarized light beam is converted into OAM in the tight focusing process. The properties of phase retardation between x and y components of the focused field are also investigated. It is found that focused field of x and y components still keeps its original elliptical polarization state, indicating that the focused field composed of x and y components still carries SAM, whereas the focused field of z component is changed into carrying OAM. The influences of the total zone number and the phase difference of binary phase FZPs with high NA on the intensity distribution in the focal plane are also investigated.     

Single-focusing regime of propagation of femtosecond light packets when self-focused in a condensed medium

Numerical simulations are used to investigate the propagation of tightly focused megawatt femtosecond light packets in a nonlinear condensed medium in the single-focusing regime. A plasma is shown to be generated in a small region whose length and diameter increase with power in the single-focusing regime of propagation of a femtosecond light packet in a transparent dielectric. The limiting electron density in the microplasma formation region is virtually independent of the laser pulse power but increases with numerical aperture of the focusing optics. At a fixed femtosecond pulse power exceeding the critical self-focusing power, the transmission of light by a dielectric layer decreases with increasing numerical aperture of the focusing optics.     

A simple analytical model of the angular momentum transformation in strongly focused light beams

A ray-optics model is proposed to describe the vector beam transformation in a strongly focusing optical system. In contrast to usual approaches based on the focused field distribution near the focal plane, we use the beam pattern formed immediately after the exit aperture. In this cross section, details of the output field distribution are of minor physical interest but proper allowance is made for transformation of the beam polarization state. This enables the spin and orbital angular momentum representations to be obtained, which are valid for any cross section of the transformed beam. Simple analytical results are available for a transversely homogeneous, circularly polarized incident beam confined by a circular aperture. Variations of the spin and orbital angular momenta of the output beam with change of the focusing strength are analyzed. The analytical results are in good qualitative and reasonable quantitative agreement with the results of numerical calculations performed for the Gaussian and Laguerre-Gaussian beams. The model supplies an efficient and physically transparent means for qualitative analysis of the spin-to-orbital angular momentum conversion. It can be generalized to incident beams with complex spatial and polarization structure.     

随机电磁涡旋光束的深聚焦特性

基于德拜矢量积分理论,研究了随机电磁涡旋光束经过大数值孔径透镜之后的聚焦特性及透镜的数值孔径、入射光束的偏振度、拓扑荷以及横向相干长度对焦平面附近聚焦光束的光强分布和相干度的影响.结果表明:适当地选择相关参量,可在焦平面上得到椭圆形光斑的光强分布以及平顶光强分布.随机电磁涡旋光束在焦平面上同一点处两个相互垂直分量之间的相干度,不同两点处两个相同分量之间的相干度以及不同两点处两个相互垂直分量之间的相干度研究表明,入射光束的拓扑荷和横向相干长度对聚焦光束的相干性有着十分明显的影响.     

光子角动量在环形金属纳米孔异常透射过程中的作用

在环形凹槽包围环形金属纳米孔的异常透射器件的研究中,环形凹槽可以将携带光子角动量的入射光转化为涡旋表面等离极化激元,这些涡旋表面等离极化激元传向几何中心并与直接照射在环形纳米孔上的光子发生干涉,当相互干涉的光子满足相位匹配条件时,环形纳米孔的透射率得到显著增强.本文利用理论分析和数值计算的方法研究了光子角动量和凹槽半径对环形纳米孔透射过程的影响.我们发现调节环形凹槽的半径和入射光携带的光子角动量可以调节光子在金膜上表面传输时的径向传播相位,进而影响了环形纳米孔附近的干涉电场强度,最终决定了环形纳米孔的透射率,进而可以通过调节凹槽的半径来调节携带不同光子角动量的光束在环形纳米孔的透射率.本文的研究结果对基于涡旋表面等离极化激元的异常透射器件的设计具有重要的指导意义.     

Optical forces and torques in nonuniform beams of light

The spin angular momentum in an elliptically polarized beam of light plays several noteworthy roles in optical traps. It contributes to the linear momentum density in a nonuniform beam, and thus to the radiation pressure exerted on illuminated objects. It can be converted into orbital angular momentum, and thus can exert torques even on optically isotropic objects. Its curl, moreover, contributes to both forces and torques without spin-to-orbit conversion. We demonstrate these effects experimentally by tracking colloidal spheres diffusing in elliptically polarized optical tweezers. Clusters of spheres circulate deterministically about the beam's axis. A single sphere, by contrast, undergoes stochastic Brownian vortex circulation that maps out the optical force field.     

离轴高斯涡旋光束的深聚焦特性

基于德拜矢量衍射积分理论,对离轴高斯涡旋光束经过大数值孔径透镜后聚焦场的特性进行了研究,获得了离轴高斯涡旋光束深聚焦后复振幅分布函数,在此基础上对离轴高斯涡旋光束深聚焦场的光强和相位分别进行了分析.数值模拟结果表明:离轴距离的改变对高斯涡旋光束在焦平面上的光强分布和相位分布会产生影响,离轴距离的增加会加剧聚焦场光强在y轴方向上分布的差异,而离轴距离的符号决定了光强集中区域的方向.另一方面,与一阶离轴涡旋光束不同,高阶离轴涡旋光束经过深聚焦后会发生暗核分裂现象,出现多个相位奇点,奇点个数等于原始光束对应的拓扑荷数,且分裂后的奇点具有明显的对称性.研究表明,这种暗核分裂现象由大数值孔径透镜深聚焦引起.     

Rotational motions of optically trapped microscopic particles by a vortex femtosecond laser

The rotational motions of the optically trapped microscopic particles by the vortex femtosecond laser beam are investigated in this paper.Black particles can be trapped and rotated by a vortex femtosecond laser beam very effectively because the vortex beam carries orbital angular momentum due to the helical wave-front structure in assoication with the central phase singularity.Trapped black particles rotate in the vortex beam due to the absorption of the angular momentum transferred from the vortex beam.The rotating directions of the trapped particles can be modulated by reversing the topological charge of the optical vortex in the vortex femtosecond beam.And the rotating speeds of the trapped microscopic particles greatly depend on the topological charges of the vortex tweezer and the used pulse energies.     

Generation of all-fiber femtosecond vortex laser based on NPR mode-locking and mechanical LPG

An all-fiber femtosecond vortex laser based on common fiber components is constructed. It can produce femtosecond orbital angular momentum modes whose time pulse width is 398 fs. The topological charge of output orbital angular momentum(OAM) modes from this laser can be adjusted among 0, +1, and-1 easily while it is also easy to convert between continuous OAM modes and pulse OAM modes.     

Tightly focusing of linearly polarized vortex beams through a dielectric interface

Based on vectorial Debye theory, the tightly focusing properties of linearly polarized vortex beams through a dielectric interface are studied. Then the intensity distribution in the focal region is investigated in detail by numerical calculations. The focal shifts induced by the mismatch of the refractive indices across the interface has been found. And the dependence of focal shifts and spot size of the focused field on the probe depth and numerical aperture of the objective are presented. Furthermore, the characteristic of intensity pattern of the cross section of the focused field is illustrated, finding that the intensity pattern rotates with the propagation of beams.     

Multiple foci and a long filament observed with focused femtosecond pulse propagation in fused silica

Multiple foci and a long filament are observed when we focus a femtosecond laser pulse into a fused-silica sample. The dependences of the intensity distribution of the plasma luminescence on the pulse energy and the numerical aperture (NA) of the focusing objective are investigated. Multiple foci are observed when NA of 相似文献   

Tight focusing of spirally polarized vortex beams

The tight focusing of spirally polarized focused vortex beams is analyzed numerically based on the vectorial Debye theory. The expressions for the electric field and the orbital angular momentum of focused beams are derived. It is shown that the intensity distribution in the focal plane is dependent on the specific spirally polarized state and the coefficient of the spiral polarization function. By presenting the phase contours of the component polarized in the radial direction, it is found that the radii of dislocation lines will increase with the increase of the power of the spirally polarization function. It is reveled that the same orbital angular momentum can be obtained for different spirally polarized state at certain distance along the propagation direction in the focal region. Besides, the orbital angular momentum distributions for different polarized states have fewer crossover points with each other for higher topological charge. The influence of the spirally polarized state on the orbital angular momentum in the focal plane is also studied.     

Electron vortices in photoionization by a pair of elliptically polarized attosecond pulses

The photoionization by two elliptically polarized, time delayed attosecond pulses is investigated to display a momentum distribution having the helical vortex or ring structures. The results are obtained by the strong field approximation method and analyzed by the pulse decomposition. The ellipticities and time delay of the two attosecond pulses are found to determine the rotational symmetry and the number of vortex arms. For observing these vortex patterns, the energy bandwidth and temporal duration of the attosecond pulses are ideal.     

Extracting the phase distribution of the electron wave packet ionized by an elliptically polarized laser pulse

We use an interferometic scheme to extract the phase distribution of the electron wave packet from above-threshold ionization in elliptically polarized laser fields. In this scheme, an electron wave packet released from a circularly polarized laser pulse acts as a reference wave and interferes with the electron wave packet ionized by a time-delayed counter-rotating elliptically polarized laser field. The generated vortex-shaped interference pattern in the photoelectron momentum distribution enables us to extract the phase distribution of the electron wave packet in the elliptically polarized laser pulse with high precision. By artificially screening the ionic potential at different ranges when solving the time-dependent Schördinger equation, we find that the angle-dependent phase distribution of the electron wave packet in the elliptically polarized laser field shows an obvious angular shift as compared to the strong-field approximation, whose value is the same as the attoclock shift. We also show that the amplitude of the angle-dependent phase distribution is sensitive to the ellipticity of the laser pulse, providing an alternative way to precisely calibrate the laser ellipticity in the attoclock measurement.     

Linear and angular momenta in tightly focused vortex segmented beams of light(Invited Paper)

We investigate the linear momentum density of light,which can be decomposed into spin and orbital parts,in the complex three-dimensional field distributions of tightly focused vortex segmented beams.The chosen angular spectrum exhibits two spatially separated vortices of opposite charge and orthogonal circular polarization to generate phase vortices in a meridional plane of observation.In the vicinity of those vortices,regions of negative orbital linear momentum occur.Besides these phase vortices,the occurrence of transverse orbital angular momentum manifests in a vortex charge-dependent relative shift of the energy density and linear momentum density.     

Light field characteristics of reflective thin-films irradiated by femtosecond laser pulses

The formation of interference field in optical thin-films is a process of unsteady state when irradiated by femtosecond pulses. Based on the methods of plane-wave decomposition and the using of thin-film characteristic matrix, the model is presented focusing on the issues of mirror reflectance and internal light field in femtosecond timescale. The numerical results reveal that with the decrease of the pulse width a reduction of reflection performance occurs. In addition, the traditional approach that simplifies the incident femtosecond pulse to monochromatic continuous wave cannot get the exact value of the light field magnitude and the temporal profile of ultrashort laser pulse should be taken into account to reach more accurate results.     

Experimental verification on tightly focused radially polarized vortex beams

The theoretical and experimental results of tightly focused radially polarized vortex beams are demonstrated. An auto-focus technology is introduced into the measurement system in order to enhance the measurement precision, and the radially polarized vortex beams are generated by a liquid-crystal polarization converter and a vortex phase plate. The focused fields of radially polarized vortex beams with different topological charges at numerical apertures （NAs） of 0.65 and 0.85 are measured respectively, and the results indicate that the total intensity distribution at focus is dependent not only on the NA of the focusing objective lens and polarization pattern of the beam but also on the topological charge l of the beam. Some unique focusing properties of radially polarized vortex beams with fractional topological charges are presented based on numerical calculations. The experimental verification paves the way for some practical applications of radially polarized vortex beams, such as in optical trapping, near-field microscopy, and material processing.