Optimal phase steps of multi-level spiral phase plates

Abstract We analyze vortex properties of the optical beams generated by a multi-level spiral phase plate (MLSPP) and find that this kind of beams consists of vortex components with topological charges of L  −  kM , where k is zero or any integer, M is the level number and L is the intrinsic topological charge of the MLSPP. We proved that the orbital angular momentum of the beams generated by a MLSPP reaches its maximum only if the phase steps (or the ratio of M to L ) satisfies some special conditions.

[1]  Takahiro Kuga,et al.  Novel Optical Trap of Atoms with a Doughnut Beam , 1997 .

[2]  Marco W. Beijersbergen,et al.  Helical-wavefront laser beams produced with a spiral phaseplate , 1994 .

[3]  Michael P. MacDonald,et al.  Revolving interference patterns for the rotation of optically trapped particles , 2002 .

[4]  W. M. Lee,et al.  Optical vortex beam shaping by use of highly efficient irregular spiral phase plates for optical micromanipulation. , 2004, Optics letters.

[5]  M. Nakatsuka,et al.  Laguerre-Gaussian beam generated with a multilevel spiral phase plate for high intensity laser pulses. , 2004 .

[6]  Min Gu,et al.  Generation of doughnut laser beams by use of a liquid-crystal cell with a conversion efficiency near 100%. , 2002, Optics letters.

[7]  David G Grier,et al.  Modulated optical vortices. , 2003, Optics letters.

[8]  Kishan Dholakia,et al.  Direct electron-beam writing of continuous spiral phase plates in negative resist with high power efficiency for optical manipulation , 2004 .

[9]  Karlton Crabtree,et al.  Optical processing with vortex-producing lenses. , 2004, Applied optics.

[10]  G. Swartzlander,et al.  Optical vortex coronagraph. , 2005, Optics letters.

[11]  Jennifer E. Curtis,et al.  Dynamic holographic optical tweezers , 2002 .

[12]  Kin Seng Chiang,et al.  Analysis of apodized phase-shifted long-period fiber gratings , 2005 .

[13]  Alexander Jesacher,et al.  Size selective trapping with optical "cogwheel" tweezers. , 2004, Optics express.

[14]  W Sibbett,et al.  Controlled Rotation of Optically Trapped Microscopic Particles , 2001, Science.

[15]  J Campos,et al.  Image processing with the radial Hilbert transform: theory and experiments. , 2000, Optics letters.

[16]  P. Shum,et al.  Dynamic switching of optical vortices with dynamic gamma-correction liquid crystal spiral phase plate. , 2005, Optics express.

[17]  G. Swartzlander,et al.  Peering into darkness with a vortex spatial filter. , 2001, Optics letters.

[18]  K. T. Gahagan,et al.  Optical vortex trapping of particles , 1996, Summaries of papers presented at the Conference on Lasers and Electro-Optics.

[19]  Jing-Liang He,et al.  Optimal annulus structures of optical vortices. , 2004, Optics express.

[20]  P. Shum,et al.  Generating doughnut-shaped beams with large charge numbers by use of liquid-crystal spiral phase plates. , 2004, Applied optics.