Polarization in diffractive optics and metasurfaces

Abstract

Polarization, the path traced by light’s electric field vector, appears in all areas of optics. In recent decades, various technologies have enabled the precise control of light’s polarization state, even on a subwavelength scale, at optical frequencies. In this review, we provide a thorough, high-level review of the fundamentals of polarization optics and detail how the Jones calculus, alongside Fourier optics, can be used to analyze, classify, and compare these optical elements. We provide a review of work in this area across multiple technologies and research areas, including recent developments in optical metasurfaces. This review unifies a large body of work on spatially varying polarization optics and may be of interest to both researchers in optics and designers of optical systems more generally.

Document Details

Document Type
Pub Defense Publication
Publication Date
Dec 31, 2021
Source ID
10.1364/aop.439986

Entities

People

  • Federico Capasso
  • Noah A Rubin
  • Zhujun Shi

Organizations

  • Air Force Office of Scientific Research
  • Apple Inc.
  • Harvard University
  • National Science Foundation

Tags

Fields of Study

  • Physics

Readers

  • Optical Physics and Photonics.
  • Systems Analysis and Design
  • Technical Research and Report Writing.