Angular momentum decomposition of nonparaxial light beams.
The total angular momentum per unit length of a general non-paraxial beam is decomposed into an orbital component associated with the spiral spectrum at the far field and a component concerning the balance between right- and left-handed circular-polarization content of the angular spectrum. Expressions for the linear momentum and energy per unit length are also provided. The well-known division into orbital and spin components is shown to be recovered in the paraxial limit.
Martínez-Herrero
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Departamento de Optica, Facultad de Ciencias Físicas, Universidad Complutense de Madrid, 28040-Madrid, Spain.
Mejías
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