Topological aspects of polarization structured beams

Abstract

Polarization structured optical beams have half-integer topological structures: star, lemon, monstar in π-symmetric polarization ellipse orientation tensor field and integer-index topological structures: saddle, spiral, node in 2π-symmetric Poynting vector field. Topological approach to study the polarization structured optical beams is carried out and presented here in some detail. These polarization structured light beams are demonstrated to be the best platform to explore the topological interdependencies. The dependence of one type of topological structure on the other is used to control the Poynting vector density distribution and locally enhance the angular momentum density as compared to its constituent beam fields.