Rotating photons: the angular momentum of light from the spin form
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Seminario del Dpto. de Física de los Materiales UAM Viernes 12 de Febrero de 2010. 15:00 h. Sala de seminarios del Dpto. Física de Materiales, C04 Rotating photons: the angular momentum of light from the spin form to the orbital form, and related quantum effects Prof. Lorenzo Marrucci Dipartimento di Scienze Fisiche Università degli Studi di Napoli Federico II Napoli, Italy Abstract: A beam of light, or even a single photon, can carry two different forms of angular momentum: the "spin" form, associated with a circular polarization, and the "orbital" form, associated with a helical wavefront and with an optical vortex at the beam axis. Few years ago, we have found that an optical medium that is both birefringent and inhomogeneous can couple these two forms of angular momentum to each other and thus give rise to a "conversion" from one form to the other. This effect, in turn, can be exploited for controlling the quantum state of the photon angular momentum, thus opening the way to the demonstration of several novel quantum processes
