Experimental confirmation of the transversal symmetry breaking in laser profiles

Abstract

The Snell phase effects on the propagation of optical beams through dielectric blocks have been matter of recent theoretical studies. The effects of this phase on the laser profiles have been tested in our experiment. The data show an excellent agreement with the theoretical predictions confirming the axial spreading modification and the transversal symmetry breaking. The possibility to set, by rotating the dielectric blocks, different configurations allows to recover the transversal symmetry. Based on this experimental evidence, dielectric blocks can be used as alternative optical tools to control the beam profile.

11 pages, 3 figures

References in corpus (3)

• Goos-Hänchen and Imbert-Fedorov beam shifts: An overview
• The use of the stationary phase method as a mathematical tool to determine the path of optical beams
• Maximal breaking of symmetry at critical angle and closed form expression for angular deviations of the Snell law

Cited by in corpus (4)

• Optimizing weak measurements to detect angular deviations
• Lateral shifts and angular deviations of Gaussian optical beams reflected by and transmitted through dielectric blocks: A tutorial review
• Experimental evidence of laser power oscillations induced by the relative Fresnel (Goos-Haenchen) phase
• The effect of the geometrical optical phase on the propagation of Hermite-Gaussian beams through transversal and parallel dielectric blocks