Dynamics of optical spin-orbit coupling in uniaxial crystals

Etienne Brasselet (1) , Yana V. Izdebskaya (2) , Vladlen G. Shvedov (2, 3, 4) , Anton S. Desyatnikov (2) , Wieslaw Krolikowski (4) , Yuri S. Kivshar (2)

1 CPMOH - Centre de physique moléculaire optique et hertzienne
2 Nonlinear Physics Center
3 Department of Physics
4 Laser Physics Center

We study theoretically and verify experimentally the detailed dynamics of spin-to-orbital angular momentum conversion for a circularly polarized Gaussian beam propagating along the optical axis of a uniaxial crystal. We extend the results to the case of white-light beams when each of the spectral components undergoes its own wavelength-dependent angular momentum conversion process.

Etienne Brasselet, Yana V. Izdebskaya, Vladlen G. Shvedov, Anton S. Desyatnikov, Wieslaw Krolikowski, et al.. Dynamics of optical spin-orbit coupling in uniaxial crystals. Optics Letters, 2009, 34 (7), pp.1021-1023. ⟨10.1364/OL.34.001021⟩. ⟨hal-00505924⟩