Fragmental optical vortex for the detection of rotating object based on the rotational Doppler effect.

Abstract

Rotational Doppler effect (RDE), as a counterpart of the conventional linear Doppler effect in the rotating frame, has attracted increasing attention in recent years on rotational object detection. Many previous works have investigated the RDE based on the whole optical vortex field. In this work, we report on the RDE of the partially obstructed optical vortex and the corresponding rotational speed extraction method. Based on the orbital angular momentum (OAM) mode analysis theory, we establish the relationship between the OAM spectrum and the RDE frequency shift of fragmental optical vortex (FOV). The mechanism of the rotational speed extraction is analysed and validated by the numerical simulation and experiments. Further, a dual Fourier transformation method is proposed to accurately obtain the rotational speed which successfully overcomes the problem of the discrete distribution of the RDE signals. Our work may be useful for practical remote sensing based on the optical RDE metrology.