Electromagnetic Vortex Topologies from Sparse Circular Phased Arrays

Abstract

Structured vortex waves have numerous applications in optics, plasmonics, radio-wave technologies and acoustics. We present a theoretical study of a method for generating vortex states based on coherent superposition of waves from discrete elements of planar phased arrays, given limitations on an element number. Using Jacobi-Anger expansion, we analyze emerging vortex topologies and derive a constraint for the least number of elements needed to generate a vortex with a given leading-order topological charge.

11 pages, 4 figures; references and discussion added

References in corpus (2)

• Formation of optical vortices using coherent laser beam arrays
• Phase vortices from a Young's three-pinhole interferometer

Cited by in corpus (3)

• Topological water-wave structures manipulating particles
• Topology and Polarization of Optical Vortex Fields from Atomic Phased Arrays
• Time-diffracting 2D wave vortices