Ultrafast Spin-to-Orbit and Orbit-to-Local-Spin Conversions of Tightly Focused Hybridly Polarized Light Pulses

TL;DR

This paper investigates ultrafast spin-to-orbit and orbit-to-local-spin conversions in tightly focused hybridly polarized light pulses, revealing how vortex phase presence influences dynamic angular momentum transfer in high numerical aperture systems.

Contribution

It introduces a time-dependent vectorial diffractive theory to analyze ultrafast spin-orbit interactions, highlighting the role of vortex phase in controlling angular momentum conversions.

Findings

Spin-to-orbit conversion is controllable via temporal effects in non-vortex pulses.

Vortex phase enables local circular polarization independent of ultrafast timing.

Ultrafast interconversions expand the understanding of photonic spin-orbit interactions.

Abstract

Spin-orbit interaction (SOI) have provided a new viable roadmap for the development of spin-based photonics devices. However, existing strategies to control the SOI focus commonly on tailoring the spatial dimension of light fields yet neglecting the inherent temporal one. Herein, we first present ultrafast temporal effects on both spin-to-orbit and orbit-to-local-spin conversions based on the time-assistant vectorial diffractive theory and the fast Fourier transformation. Such interconversions depend upon whether the incident hybridly vectorial light pulse carries vortex phase or not in a single high numerical aperture geometry. For the case of the absence of vortex phase, we find that it enables orbit angular momentum-carrying transverse component fields, and the resultant orbit angular momentum embedded within focused light fields remains constantly revolving as time elapses, which indicates that the controllable spin-to-orbit conversion occurs. By contrast, it is revealed that hybridly polarized vectorial-vortex light pulses allow access to the locally excited circular polarization at the focus, and this induced local circular polarization is independent of ultrafast varying time, whereas the resulting spin angular momentum density components experience the alternation between the appearance and annihilation over time, thus giving rise to the tunable orbit-to-local-spin conversion. These exotic ultrafast interconversions not only breathe a new life into the area of ultrafast photonics, but refresh our understanding on the paradigm of photonic SOI.