2017/03/31 by Ze-Di Cheng, Zhao-Di Liu, Xi-Wang Luo +8
Materials Science · Physics and Astronomy · #Angular momentum #Angular momentum coupling #Angular momentum of light #Degenerate energy levels #Metamaterials and Metasurfaces Applications #Orbital Angular Momentum in Optics #Orbital angular momentum multiplexing #Orbital angular momentum of light #Photon #Quantum #Quantum Mechanics and Non-Hermitian Physics #Quantum optics #quant-ph
paper · pdf · doi:10.1364/ol.42.002042
published as Optics Letters Vol. 42, Issue 10, pp. 2042-2045 (2017) · 4 pages, 4 figures, optics letters
openalex created_date 2017/03/16 · arxiv created 2017/05/09 · openalex publication_date 2017/05/11 · arxiv updated 2017/05/18 · openalex updated_date 2026/08/05
Photons propagating in Laguerre-Gaussian modes have characteristic orbital angular momenta, which are fundamental optical degrees of freedom. The orbital angular momentum of light has potential application in high-capacity optical communication and even in quantum information processing. In this work, we experimentally construct a ring cavity with four lenses and four mirrors that is completely degenerate for Laguerre-Gaussian modes. By measuring the transmitted peaks and patterns of different modes, the ring cavity is shown to support more than 31 Laguerre-Gaussian modes. The constructed degenerate cavity opens a new way for using the unlimited resource of available angular momentum states simultaneously.