Laguerre-Gaussian mode sorter

Understand

Light's spatial properties represent an infinite state space, making it attractive for applications requiring high dimensionality, such as quantum mechanics and classical telecommunications, but also inherently spatial applications such as imaging and sensing.

• However, there is no demultiplexing device in the spatial domain comparable to a grating or calcite for the wavelength and polarisation domains respectively.
• Specifically, a simple device capable of splitting a finite beam into a large number of discrete spatially separated spots each containing a single orthogonal spatial component.
• We demonstrate a device capable of decomposing a beam into a Cartesian grid of identical Gaussian spots each containing a single Laguerre-Gaussian component.