Geometrical Spinoptics and the Optical Hall Effect

TL;DR

This paper extends geometrical optics to include spin and color, developing a theory of geometrical spinoptics that predicts phenomena like the optical Hall effect through symplectic scattering and generalized laws.

Contribution

It introduces a novel geometrical spinoptics framework based on coadjoint orbits, incorporating spin and color into light ray models and explaining the optical Hall effect.

Findings

Generalized Snell-Descartes laws derived from symplectic scattering

Prediction of optical Hall effect within the geometrical optics framework

Development of a theory for spinning light rays in refractive media

Abstract

Geometrical optics is extended so as to provide a model for spinning light rays via the coadjoint orbits of the Euclidean group characterized by color and spin. This leads to a theory of ``geometrical spinoptics'' in refractive media. Symplectic scattering yields generalized Snell-Descartes laws that include the recently discovered optical Hall effect.