The analogy between optical beam shifts and quantum weak measurements

TL;DR

This paper draws an analogy between optical beam shifts and quantum weak measurements, revealing how classical optical phenomena can mimic quantum measurement effects and predicting new beam shift phenomena.

Contribution

It introduces a novel analogy linking optical beam shifts to quantum weak measurements, providing new insights and predictions for beam behavior.

Findings

Optical beam shifts can be understood as classical analogues of quantum weak measurements.

Complex quantum weak values correspond to spatial and angular shifts in polarized beams.

Predicted an additional spatial shift for beams with radially-varying phase.

Abstract

We describe how the notion of optical beam shifts (including the spatial and angular Goos-H\"anchen shift and Imbert-Federov shift) can be understood as a classical analogue of a quantum measurement of the polarization state of a paraxial beam by its transverse amplitude distribution. Under this scheme, complex quantum weak values are interpreted as spatial and angular shifts of polarized scalar components of the reflected beam. This connection leads us to predict an extra spatial shift for beams with a radially-varying phase dependence.