# Reading the orbital angular momentum of light using plasmonic nanoantennas

## TL;DR

This paper introduces a novel method to directly read the orbital angular momentum of light using plasmonic nanoantennas, converting angular momentum information into spectral signals for potential on-chip quantum communication.

## Contribution

It proposes a new approach employing plasmonic nanoantennas to detect orbital angular momentum of light via spectral changes, supported by an analytical model.

## Key findings

- Nanoantennas' scattering cross-section is sensitive to orbital angular momentum and polarization.
- Spectral information can be used to determine the orbital angular momentum of incident light.
- The method enables potential on-chip quantum communication using twisted light.

## Abstract

Orbital angular momentum of light has recently been recognized as a new degree of freedom to encode information in quantum communication using light pulses. Methods to extract this information include reversing the process by which such twisted light was created in the first place or interference with other beams. Here, we propose an alternative new way to directly read out the extra information encoded in twisted light using plasmonic nanoantennas by con- verting the information about the orbital angular momentum of light into spectral information using bright and dark modes. Exemplarily considering rotation-symmetrical nanorod nanoan- tennas we show that their scattering cross-section is sensitive to the value of the orbital angular momentum combined with the polarisation of an incident twisted light beam. Explaining the twist-dependence of the excited modes with a new analytical model our results pave the way to twisted light nanoplasmonics, which is of central importance for future on-chip communication using orbital angular momentum of light.