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Experimental verification of photon angular

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Article in Applied Physics Letters · November 2011

DOI: 10.1063/1.3659466

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 APPLIED PHYSICS LETTERS 99, 204102 (2011)

Experimental verification of photon angular momentum and vorticity

with radio techniques
Fabrizio Tamburini,1 Elettra Mari,2 Bo Thidé,3 Cesare Barbieri,1 and Filippo Romanato1,4,a)
1
Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Padova, via Marzolo 8, IT-35131 Padova, Italy
2
CISAS, Centro Interdipartimentale di Studi e Attività Spaziali G. Colombo, University of Padova,
Via Venezia 15, IT- 35131 Padova, Italy

3
Swedish Institute of Space Physics, Angström Laboratory, Box 537, SE-75121 Uppsala, Sweden
4
LaNN, Laboratory for Nanofabrication of Nanodevices, Venetonanotech, via Stati Uniti 4,
IT-35100 Padova, Italy

(Received 21 May 2011; accepted 17 October 2011; published online 16 November 2011)
The experimental evidence that radio techniques can be used for synthesizing and analyzing
non-integer electromagnetic (EM) orbital angular momentum (OAM) of radiation is presented. The
technique used amounts to sample, in space and time, the EM field vectors and digitally processing
the data to calculate the vortex structure, the spatial phase distribution, and the OAM spectrum of
the radiation. The experimental verification that OAM-carrying beams can be readily generated
and exploited by using radio techniques paves the way to an entirely new paradigm of radar and
radio communication protocols. V C 2011 American Institute of Physics. [doi:10.1063/1.3659466]

That electromagnetic (EM) fields can carry not only be decomposed into a Fourier series superposition of orthogo-
energy and linear momentum but also angular momentum nal OAM states10
over very large distances has been known for over a century.
However, it is less than twenty years ago that optical meth- expðipaÞ sinðpaÞ X1
expðimuÞ
expðiauÞ ¼ ; m 2 Z:
ods for the manipulation of light in well-defined EM orbital p m¼1
am
angular momentum (OAM) eigenstates were developed,1 (1)
thereby enabling and initiating a systematic utilization of
photon OAM in science2–5 and technology,6–8 down to the This decomposition reflects the facts that topological charges
single photon level. In classical electrodynamics terms, the of vortices always have integer values and that each photon
electromagnetic field (E, B) in a volume V of free space, of the beam can take any integer value corresponding to an
where the dielectricÐ permittivity is 0, carries the total linear OAM of mh (Ref. 11). Numerical experiments have shown
momentum p ¼ e0 V dx3 ðE  BÞ, associated with transla- how low-frequency radio beams can be readily prepared in
tional dynamics Ðand force action, and the total angular mo- pure OAM eigenstates and their superpositions.12 The results
mentum J ¼ e0 V dx3 ðx  x0 Þ  ðE  BÞ, associated with from these numerical experiments are confirmed in the labo-
rotational dynamics and torque action about the moment ratory experiments reported in the present letter.
point x0 . To leading order in distance from the source We performed this laboratory experiment in the large
r ¼ jx  x0 j, the conserved physical observables p and J are anechoic antenna chamber of the Ångström Laboratory of the
independent of r. This is why both of them can carry infor- Uppsala University, Sweden. The chamber is electromagneti-
mation over arbitrarily large distances.9 It is worth noticing cally as well as acoustically/vibrationally shielded. The meas-
that the linear momentum p from a radiation source may urements were performed at 2.4 GHz (12.49 cm wavelength),
tend to zero at infinity, while the angular momentum J from and the source was realized with a commercial off-the-shelf
the same source may tend to a non-zero constant there. This (COTS) seven-element Yagi-Uda antenna for 2.4–2.5 GHz
is typically the case of an OAM structured electromagnetic WLAN communications, fed with a continuous 0.01 W mono-
beam whose field intensity falls off sufficiently rapidly with chromatic signal from a signal generator. The radio beam was
distance from the beam axis. The total angular momentum reflected off a discrete eight-step staircase phase mask that
can be written as J ¼ SþL, where the spin angular momen- represents a discrete approximation of a non-focusing spiral
tum S is associated with the two states of wave polarization, reflector designed for a total 2p phase shift spiral; see Fig. 1.
whereas the orbital angular momentum L, which is inti- The reflector had N discrete jumps and a surface pitch gr (in
mately related to beam vorticity and phase singularities, the right-handed sense). At the wavelength k the reflected
spans a state space of a denumerable infinite dimension. beam acquires a total OAM value evaluated as8
A pure L eigenstate is characterized by a quantized  
topological charge m 2 Z in the phase term expðimuÞ, 2gr N þ 1
a¼ : (2)
where u is the azimuthal angle around the beam axis. In k N
most cases in nature, however, the total OAM is a non-
integer value a 2R. Such a non-integer OAM state can For gr ¼ 6:22 cm, k ¼ 12.49 cm (m ¼ 2.40 GHz) and N ¼ 8
as in the experiments reported here, this formula predicts
that the reflected radio beam had a total non-integer OAM
a)
Electronic mail: [email protected]. value of a  1.12.

0003-6951/2011/99(20)/204102/3/$30.00 99, 204102-1 C 2011 American Institute of Physics

V

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204102-2 Tamburini et al. Appl. Phys. Lett. 99, 204102 (2011)

To determine the phase in the far zone, two identical

COTS WLAN dipole antennas, both oriented along
x-direction transverse to the radio beam axis, were used in a
interferometric configuration set up. One of the receiving
antennas was held at a fixed position far from the singularity,
Ex0, and conventionally taken at the maximum of Ex in order
to maximize the signal response. The other antenna was
moved around to sample the field signal at different fixed
grid points. The difference of two antenna signals,
DEx ¼ Ex  Ex0 , has been mapped out (Fig. 2(c)) and com-
pared with the corresponding fields difference simulation
(Fig. 2(d)). The raw experimental data show the presence of
a strong modulation of the DEx field characterized by a
change of the sign along the direction of the step (45 ) and
roughly centred on the singularity point.
The experimental and simulated phase distributions (Figs
2(e) and 2(f) respectively) have been extracted from the DEx
field (Figs. 2(c) and 2(d)) and the Ex field intensity map (Figs.
2(a) and 2(b)) by using a simple analytical formula (the phase
u is obtained from the Ex and from the field difference maps
FIG. 1. (Color online) The spiral reflector that imposes OAM to the antenna DE2 E2 E2
beam was made from styrofoam blocks, trimmed into a staircase-like struc-
using the following relation, cos u ¼ x2Ex E0x0x x .) Notwith-
ture with eight steps. Each staircase of the structure introduced a local, suc- standing some spurious signal in the experimental map, the
cessive, discontinuous phase step of p/8 radians, except in the 45 major features of the spatial phase distribution are clearly rec-
direction where the phase step was þ2p radians.
ognizable. Because in our case the OAM state number is not
The horizontal transverse component of the electric field too different from the pure state with a ¼ 1, many of the phase
of the reflected, twisted radio beam, Ex, was detected by map features are similar to the phase map phase term expðiuÞ.
using a single COTS electric dipole antenna for WLAN. The Namely, it can be observed the clockwise increase of the
EX was sampled in correspondence of fixed square grid phase around the singularity point that eventually results in
points of 3 cm lattice period, reported on a plane placed in the 2p phase step across the 45 direction, i.e., along the
the far zone, about 55k away from the non-focusing reflector. direction corresponding to the mask cut (see Fig. 1). As
The spatial map of Ex (Fig. 2(a)) shows the existence of expected, the symmetry axis of the vortex structure and the
OAM spatial field distribution in the radio beam represented phase singularity are both aligned. In the numerical far zone
by a sub-wavelength hairpin shaped configuration centred propagation, we have not taken in account the effects of the
around a central minimum (x ¼ 12 cm, y ¼ 9 cm). In the ideal atmosphere turbulence as it is well known to be negligible in
case of a beam endowed with a pure state OAM m ¼ 61, the the radio wave propagation. Our simulations show that the
typical fingerprint of a field intensity is a perfect doughnut- monochromatic and coherent beam propagates in vacuum
shaped intensity map. In our case the Ex field intensity distri- without any modification of the line phase singularity and
bution is slightly suppressed in the þ45 direction as an without decaying into a cascade of pairs of vortex-antivortex
effect of the non-integer character of a and of the corre- like expected in a turbulent inhomogeneous medium. These
sponding imperfect phase matching over the full circuit features of phase map dependence clearly indicate the
around the central minimum. We have taken into account the expðiauÞ electromagnetic OAM vortex structure harboured in
expected non-integer OAM value a ¼ 1:12 in the simula- the reflected radio beam.
tion of Ex map (Fig. 2(b)) obtaining a quite satisfactorily The OAM (spiral) spectrum of the experimental phase
agreement with our experimental findings. map has been computed13 and reported in Figs. 2(g) and 2(h)

FIG. 2. (Color online) Map (a) Experimental map of the transverse electrical field intensity obtained by probing the radio beam in a plane perpendicular to the
beam axis. (b) Simulation of the field intensity. The colour scale is normalized to the maximum value measured of 7.5 lV/cm. The vortex singularity corre-
sponds to the deep field minimum. Difference of two antenna signals: (c) experimental and (d) simulation. The maximum value measured was 9.5 lV/cm. (e)
Experimental and (f) simulated phase maps obtained from the interference of two antenna signals. The phase step across the direction 45 indicates the pres-
ence of the vortex structure. For all the maps the position is expressed in cm. Histograms of OAM spectrum weight: experimental (g) and simulated (h).

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204102-3 Tamburini et al. Appl. Phys. Lett. 99, 204102 (2011)

for the experimental and simulated data respectively. The group–Orseolo Restauri, and the kind hospitality of Uppsala
OAM components m ¼ 0, m 6 1, and m 6 2 are the most rele- University. F.R. and F.T. acknowledge the Padua University
vant in particular for the experimental map, whereas the other project 2011 Study of orbital angular momentum. The
higher OAM components (jmj ¼ 3, 4,…,10) give only minor Ångström Laboratory antenna chamber was funded by a
contributions. Both the experimental and simulation OAM grant from the Knut and Alice Wallenberg Foundation.
spectra show an asymmetric dominance towards the negative
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