Measuring Topological Charges of Optical Vortices with Multi-Singularity Using a Cylindrical Lens. (1st February 2015)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Peng, Yu; Gan, Xue-Tao; Ju, Pei; Wang, Ya-Dong; Zhao, Jian-Lin
• Is Part Of: Chinese physics letters. Volume 32:Number 2(2015:Feb.)
• Page Start: 024201
• Publication Date: 2015-02-01
• Subjects: Physics -- Periodicals; Electronic journals; 530.05
• DOI: 10.1088/0256-307X/32/2/024201
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 0256-307X

Abstract

<abstract xml:lang="en"> <title>Abstract</title> <p>We present a simple method to measure the topological charges of optical vortices with multiple singularities. Using a cylindrical lens, a vortex beam can decay into a light field distribution with multiple separated dark holes, whose number just equals the topological charge of the input beam. This conclusion is then verified via experiments and numerical simulations of the propagation of vortex beams with multiple singularities. This method is also reliable to measure the topological charges of broadband vortex beams with different distributions of singularities, which does not resort to multiple beam interferometric experiments.</p> </abstract>