Spiraling light: from donut modes to a Magnus effect analogy
The insight that optical vortex beams carry orbital angular momentum (OAM), which emerged in Leiden about 30 years ago, has since led to an ever expanding range of applications and follow-up studies. This paper starts with a short personal account of how these concepts arose. This is followed by a d...
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
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De Gruyter
2021-11-01
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| Series: | Nanophotonics |
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| Online Access: | https://doi.org/10.1515/nanoph-2021-0458 |
| _version_ | 1797947940164075520 |
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| author | Spreeuw Robert J. C. |
| author_facet | Spreeuw Robert J. C. |
| author_sort | Spreeuw Robert J. C. |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | The insight that optical vortex beams carry orbital angular momentum (OAM), which emerged in Leiden about 30 years ago, has since led to an ever expanding range of applications and follow-up studies. This paper starts with a short personal account of how these concepts arose. This is followed by a description of some recent ideas where the coupling of transverse orbital and spin angular momentum (SAM) in tightly focused laser beams produces interesting new effects. The deflection of a focused light beam by an atom in the focus is reminiscent of the Magnus effect known from aerodynamics. Momentum conservation dictates an accompanying light force on the atom, transverse to the optical axis. As a consequence, an atom held in an optical tweezer will be trapped at a small distance of up to λ/2π away from the optical axis, which depends on the spin state of the atom and the magnetic field direction. This opens up new avenues to control the state of motion of atoms in optical tweezers as well as potential applications in quantum gates and interferometry. |
| first_indexed | 2024-04-10T21:34:31Z |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj.art-18563d9fa41049819511716961f91d2c |
| institution | Directory Open Access Journal |
| issn | 2192-8614 |
| language | English |
| last_indexed | 2024-04-10T21:34:31Z |
| publishDate | 2021-11-01 |
| publisher | De Gruyter |
| record_format | Article |
| series | Nanophotonics |
| spelling | doaj.art-18563d9fa41049819511716961f91d2c2023-01-19T12:46:58ZengDe GruyterNanophotonics2192-86142021-11-0111463364410.1515/nanoph-2021-0458Spiraling light: from donut modes to a Magnus effect analogySpreeuw Robert J. C.0Van der Waals-Zeeman Institute, Institute of Physics, University of Amsterdam, PO Box 94485, Amsterdam1090 GL, The NetherlandsThe insight that optical vortex beams carry orbital angular momentum (OAM), which emerged in Leiden about 30 years ago, has since led to an ever expanding range of applications and follow-up studies. This paper starts with a short personal account of how these concepts arose. This is followed by a description of some recent ideas where the coupling of transverse orbital and spin angular momentum (SAM) in tightly focused laser beams produces interesting new effects. The deflection of a focused light beam by an atom in the focus is reminiscent of the Magnus effect known from aerodynamics. Momentum conservation dictates an accompanying light force on the atom, transverse to the optical axis. As a consequence, an atom held in an optical tweezer will be trapped at a small distance of up to λ/2π away from the optical axis, which depends on the spin state of the atom and the magnetic field direction. This opens up new avenues to control the state of motion of atoms in optical tweezers as well as potential applications in quantum gates and interferometry.https://doi.org/10.1515/nanoph-2021-0458optical tweezersorbital angular momentumspin–orbit coupling |
| spellingShingle | Spreeuw Robert J. C. Spiraling light: from donut modes to a Magnus effect analogy Nanophotonics optical tweezers orbital angular momentum spin–orbit coupling |
| title | Spiraling light: from donut modes to a Magnus effect analogy |
| title_full | Spiraling light: from donut modes to a Magnus effect analogy |
| title_fullStr | Spiraling light: from donut modes to a Magnus effect analogy |
| title_full_unstemmed | Spiraling light: from donut modes to a Magnus effect analogy |
| title_short | Spiraling light: from donut modes to a Magnus effect analogy |
| title_sort | spiraling light from donut modes to a magnus effect analogy |
| topic | optical tweezers orbital angular momentum spin–orbit coupling |
| url | https://doi.org/10.1515/nanoph-2021-0458 |
| work_keys_str_mv | AT spreeuwrobertjc spiralinglightfromdonutmodestoamagnuseffectanalogy |