Fundamental Properties Of Light Research Articles

The International Year of Light and Light-based Technologies

I report on the opening ceremony of the International Year of Light and Light-based Technologies 2015 (IYL2015), which took place at the UNESCO headquarters in Paris, France, on 19–20 January 2015. Over the two days, more than 1000 participants from all over the world learned more about the fundamental properties of light and advanced photonics applications, the history of optics and its applications through the centuries, light poverty and light pollution, and light for everyday life, health and research.

Nanostructured Holograms for Broadband Manipulation of Vector Beams

We report a new type of holographic interface, which is able to manipulate the three fundamental properties of light (phase, amplitude, and polarization) over a broad wavelength range. The design strategy relies on replacing the large openings of conventional holograms by arrays of subwavelength apertures, oriented to locally select a particular state of polarization. The resulting optical element can therefore be viewed as the superposition of two independent structures with very different length scales, that is, a hologram with each of its apertures filled with nanoscale openings to only transmit a desired state of polarization. As an implementation, we fabricated a nanostructured holographic plate that can generate radially polarized optical beams from circularly polarized incident light, and we demonstrated that it can operate over a broad range of wavelengths. The ability of a single holographic interface to simultaneously shape the amplitude, phase, and polarization of light can find widespread applications in photonics.

Polarisation and magnetic fields in cool stars and the Sun

AbstractAstrophysical plasmas and magnetic fields are inextricably coupled to each other. But magnetic fields are elusive; they cannot be fully characterized with standard (spectroscopic) observational techniques. Fortunately, polarisation, the third fundamental property of light, encodes all the quantitative information on the magnetism of the objects we observe. This splinter session brought together the solar and stellar spectropolarimetric communities to discuss some of the fundamental unsolved questions of solar and stellar magnetism and the future of spectropolarimetric observations. (© 2013 WILEY‐VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim)

Light: The Rope Hypothesis

We propose a physical model that provides a rational interpretation to the fundamental properties of light. The Rope Hypothesis justifies and simulates basic features and behaviors such as straightness, speed, and orthogonality, and merges light with gravity into a single mechanism.

Spin-to-Orbital Angular Momentum Conversion in a Strongly Focused Optical Beam

As a fundamental property of light, the angular momentum of photons has been of great interest. Here, we demonstrate that optical spin-to-orbital angular momentum conversion can occur in a homogeneous and isotropic medium. This Letter presents both theoretical and experimental studies of this conversion in a tightly focused beam and shows that the orbital rotation speeds of trapped particles are altered because of this conversion as predicted by theory.