CAREER: Flat Singular Optics: Generation and Detection of Optical Vortex Beams with Plasmonic Metasurfaces in Linear and Nonlinear Regimes

摘要标题：职业：平面奇异光学：线性和非线性区域等离子体超颖表面光学涡旋光束的产生和检测非技术描述：相位和偏振奇异现象的研究被称为奇异光学。涡旋光束具有奇异的标量特征，相位奇异点位于光束中心，而偏振奇异光束具有奇异的矢量特征，偏振参数不确定。目前，奇异光学领域的研究面临的挑战是如何在芯片上产生具有宽带和偏振奇异光束的纯涡旋，如何实现紧凑的线性和非线性涡旋光束转换器，以及什么样的设备能够直接识别涡旋拓扑电荷。为了解决这些挑战，在这项研究中，独特设计的等离子体超颖表面的金属纳米结构被用作一个强大的和紧凑的平台，用于探索平面奇异光学，产生奇异光束在线性和非线性制度，以及检测涡旋光束轨道角动量与光电集成。这项研究为推进光通信、光束整形和转换、光电器件以及光学传感和成像等领域的许多应用铺平了道路。奇异光学和超材料表面的研究与教育和外展活动相结合，以加强各级教育，包括本科生和研究生培训、代表性不足和女学生招生、光学学生团体组织中的女性、跨学科超材料课程开发和外展活动K-12学生。技术描述：研究的目标是探索在线性和非线性区域使用超薄等离子体元表面产生和检测光学涡旋光束，以解决开放的研究挑战，并在奇异光学中创造新的机会，获得自旋-轨道和轨道-轨道相互作用以及光学角动量守恒的基础知识。本研究采用线性和非线性光学设计和模拟、等离子体超颖表面样品纳米纤维、光学和光电器件表征等方法，研究基于超颖表面的光操纵和奇异光学、非线性光学和自旋轨道光子学中的光-物质相互作用的基础物理。该活动的智力意义包括：（i）产生纯光学涡旋光束和偏振奇异光束，以推进复杂结构光操纵和拓扑奇异性的研究;（ii）第二及第三阶段的勘探-在非线性等离子体超颖表面中的谐波涡旋光束产生和光束成形，以揭示轨道角动量守恒定律，并创建紧凑的非线性光束转换器和有源光子器件;（iii）实现基于等离子体超颖表面中的自旋和轨道霍尔效应的光电涡旋光束检测，以解决芯片上轨道角动量检测的挑战，并构建基于功能超颖表面的光电器件。

Abstract Title: CAREER: Flat Singular Optics: Generation and Detection of Optical Vortex Beams with Plasmonic Metasurfaces in Linear and Nonlinear RegimesNontechnical Description:The study of the phenomena of phase and polarization singularities is known as singular optics. Vortex beams display singular scalar features with phase singularities in the beam center, while polarization singular beams present singular vectorial features with one undefined polarization parameter. The current open research challenges in singular optics are how to generate pure vortices with broad bandwidth and polarization singular beams on chip, how to realize compact linear and nonlinear vortex beam converters, and what kind of device enables direct identification of vortex topological charges. In order to address these challenges, in this research, uniquely designed plasmonic metasurfaces made of ultrathin metallic nanostructures are utilized as a powerful and compact platform for exploring flat singular optics, generating singular optical beams in both linear and nonlinear regimes, as well as detecting vortex beam orbital angular momentum with optoelectronic integration. This research paves the way for advancing many applications in optical communication, beam shaping and conversion, optoelectronic devices, and optical sensing and imaging. The research of singular optics and metasurfaces is integrated with education and outreach activities in order to enhance various levels of education, including undergraduate and graduate students training, underrepresented and female students recruitment, women in optics student group organization, interdisciplinary metamaterials course development and outreach activities for K-12 students. Technical Description:The goals of the research are to explore the generation and detection of optical vortex beams using ultra-thin plasmonic metasurfaces in both linear and nonlinear regimes in order to solve open research challenges and create new opportunities in singular optics, gain fundamental knowledge of spin-orbit and orbit-orbit interactions and optical angular momentum conservation. The research uses the approaches of linear and nonlinear optical design and simulation, plasmonic metasurface sample nanofabrication, optical and optoelectronic device characterizations to study the underlying physics of metasurface based light manipulation and light-matter interaction in singular optics, nonlinear optics, and spin-orbit photonics. The intellectual significance of the activity includes: (i) generation of pure optical vortex beams and polarization singular beams to advance the research of complex structured light manipulation and topological singularities; (ii) exploration of second- and third-harmonic vortex beam generation and beam shaping in nonlinear plasmonic metasurfaces to reveal the conservation law of orbital angular momentum and create compact nonlinear beam converters and active photonic devices; (iii) realization of optoelectronic vortex beam detection based on spin and orbital Hall effects in plasmonic metasurfaces to solve the challenge of on-chip orbital angular momentum detection and build functional metasurface based optoelectronic devices.