title: Sub-wavelength sized transversely polarized optical needle with exceptionally suppressed side-lobes.
abstract: It is well known that radially polarized beam could produce an ultra-long longitudinally polarized focus, referred to as "optical needle". In this work, we reveal that the counterpart transversely polarized optical needle (~5.83λ) with exceptionally suppressed sidelobes (9.9% of the maximum of the principal lobe) can be generated by tightly focusing a hybridly polarized beam through a multibelt binary phase filter. A universal analytical model is built up for investigating the depth, uniformity and polarization properties of the needle. We find that there is a trade-off between needle length and intensity uniformity, and the main lobe keeps almost transverse polarization at each observation plane. Such a nondiffraction transversely polarized optical needle has potential applications in ultrahigh density magnetic storage as well as atomic trap and switches.
authors.forename: Zhongsheng
authors.initials: Z
authors.lastname: Man
authors.forename: Changjun
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Min
authors.forename: Luping
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Du
authors.forename: Yuquan
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Zhang
authors.forename: Siwei
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Zhu
authors.forename: Xiaocong
authors.initials: X
authors.lastname: Yuan