Optics Communications 250 (2005) 218230

www.elsevier.com/locate/optcom

Propagation dynamics of optical vortices in

LaguerreGaussian beams
F. Flossmann, U.T. Schwarz *, Max Maier
Naturwissenschaftliche Fakultat II, Universitat Regensburg, Universitaetsstr. 31, D-93040 Regensburg, Germany

Received 22 July 2004; received in revised form 8 February 2005; accepted 11 February 2005

Abstract

We have calculated the propagation dynamics of an initial o-axis vortex with topological charge 1 in Laguerre
Gaussian background beams LG01 and LG07 , which are examples of background beams with non-generic dislocation
surfaces, on which the real and imaginary parts of the light eld are zero. When initially a vortex with broad core (e.g.,
r-vortex) is embedded in the background beam, the dislocation surfaces are destroyed during propagation and two vor-
tices with opposite charge are created per dislocation surface in planes perpendicular to the propagation direction. For a
vortex with narrow core (e.g., point vortex) diraction is important and leads to the birth of more than two vortices per
dislocation surface. These results are also valid for other background beams with dislocation surfaces, e.g., Hermite
Gaussian and InceGaussian beams. We investigated experimentally the spatial evolution of the intensity distribution
of an initial o-axis vortex with narrow core and topological charge 1 in LG01 and LG07 background beams. The exper-
imental results are in good agreement with the calculated intensity distributions.
2005 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Keywords: Phase dislocations; Optical vortices; LaguerreGaussian beams

1. Introduction practical applications, e.g., atom guiding and

The propagation and interaction of phase dislo-
cations, in particular of optical vortices, is of inter-
est from a theoretical viewpoint [15] and for
*
Corresponding author. Tel.: +49 941 943 2113; fax: +49 941
943 2754.
E-mail address: ulrich.schwarz@physik.uni-regensburg.de
(U.T. Schwarz).
micromanipulation of particles [7,6]. A phase
dislocation is a stationary curved line in three dimen-
sions or a stationary point in two dimensions,
where the phase of the light wave is undetermined
and its amplitude is zero. For a generic dislocation
the integral over the phase change on a circuit that
encircles the line gives 2p [14]. In general, the
dislocation line forms an arbitrary angle with
the propagation direction of the wave (mixed

0030-4018/$ - see front matter 2005 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.optcom.2005.02.032
 F. Flossmann et al. / Optics Communications 250 (2005) 218230
edge-screw dislocation). Special cases are non-gen-
eric edge dislocations, which are not lines but sur-
faces in space. In Ref. [4] the nodal surfaces of
higher transverse order modes of a monochro-
matic laser beam are described as examples for
degenerate and non-generic edge dislocation sur-
faces. Special cases of laser modes are Hermite
Gaussian beams [8], LaguerreGaussian beams
[8] and InceGaussian beams [9,10], which have
planes and hyperboloids as zero-amplitude
surfaces, respectively. Further examples of non-
generic dislocation surfaces are the circular and
elliptic cylindrical zero-amplitude surfaces of Bes-
sel beams [11] and Mathieu [12,13] beams.
In order to investigate the geometry of the
three-dimensional vortex lines experimentally,
intensity distributions in successive planes perpen-
dicular to the propagation direction z have been
measured. The change of the position of the vortex
in the dierent planes is often called motion or
propagation dynamics of the vortex in the litera-
ture (see next paragraph), even though there is
no time dependence but a dependence of the posi-
tion in the xy plane on the spatial coordinate z. In
a similar sense the terms interaction and nucle-
ation have been used.
The propagation dynamics of optical vortices in
a Gaussian background beam has been investi-
gated in linear and nonlinear media [14,15].
According to a model, the phase gradient of a
rotationally symmetric background beam gives
rise to a radial motion of the vortex in the direc-
tion of the transverse energy ow. The intensity
gradient of the background beam causes motion
of the vortex along contour lines of equal inten-
sity of the background beam [1417]. So the gradi-
ents of the phase and intensity of the background
beam act like driving forces for the motion of the
vortex. It has been shown that for a Gaussian
background beam an o-axis vortex moves in the
xy plane (vertical to the propagation direction z)
on a straight line to the periphery [14]. In a repre-
sentation where the x and y coordinates of the
plane are normalised to the beam size w(z) of the
Gaussian beam, the vortex moves on a circle.
The interaction of dierent kinds of dislocations
and the propagation of mixed edge-screw disloca-
tions has been investigated only in a few cases.
219
Nucleation of additional vortices has been shown
to occur by the interaction of a vortex with an edge
dislocation in a Gaussian background beam [18].
The transformation of a mixed edge-screw disloca-
tion embedded in a Gaussian beam into several
pairs of optical vortices in the near eld and single
charge optical vortices in the far eld was investi-
gated in Refs. [19,20]. Berry [21] has studied theo-
retically the evolution of helicoidal integer and
fractional phase steps and the resulting optical
vortices. Experimental observation of optical
vortex evolution in a Gaussian beam with an
embedded fractional phase step has been reported
in Ref. [22].
The propagation of an array of o-axis vortices
in a pseudo-nondiracting background beam was
investigated in Ref. [23]. In particular, the propa-
gation dynamics of an initial J1 Bessel beam with
vortex in the centre, which was o-axis with
respect to the Gaussian envelope, was studied in
great detail [23]. The interaction of an o-axis
point vortex (topological charge 1) with the non-
generic edge dislocation surfaces of a J0 Bessel
beam, which have cylindrical shape, has been stud-
ied in Ref. [11]. It has been shown that the vortex
and the edge dislocation surfaces are combined to
form in a good approximation a mixed edge-screw
dislocation surface (strength 1), the ends of which
consist of a series of oblique dislocation lines.
Intensity pictures in the xy plane were measured
at dierent propagation distances and found to
be in good agreement with model calculations.
In this paper, we investigate theoretically and
experimentally the interaction of an optical
o-axis vortex with the non-generic dislocation
surfaces of LaguerreGaussian beams, which are
rotational hyperboloids. In addition the nucleation
of the resulting mixed edge-screw dislocation lines
is studied. This paper is organised as follows. In
Section 2 the basis for the calculations of the
propagation dynamics of the dislocations is given.
Two dierent theoretical methods are presented.
The electric eld distribution is calculated either
by a method using Fourier transformation [24]
or by a method using the expansion of the initial
electric eld in terms of orthogonal Laguerre
Gaussian functions. In Section 3, calculations of
the propagation dynamics of vortices with dierent
220 F. Flossmann et al. / Optics Communications 250 (2005) 218230
combinations of cores and background beams
with special emphasis on an r-vortex in Laguerre
Gaussian beams are presented. In Section 4, the
experimental setup is described. The experimental
results for a narrow-core vortex with charge 1 in
LaguerreGaussian LG01 and LG07 background
beams are presented in Section 5, followed by the
conclusions in Section 6.
2. Theory
The results of the calculations of the following
sections are compared later with the experimental
results, which are obtained in planes perpendicular
to the propagation direction z of the light beam.
Therefore, we use in the following, the terminology
for vortex points in transverse planes.
2.1. General
In this section, we treat the propagation of dif-
ferent kinds of vortices in LaguerreGaussian
background beams. The complex function describ-
ing a vortex can be written as
wr; / creim/a : 1 We use LaguerreGaussian LGlp beams with the
Here, c(r) describes the core function. The phase of
a vortex at position r00 = (a,0) is given by

y 
/a arctan : 2
x
a
In the literature describing experimental results the
following examples of core functions of vortices
with topological charge m = 1 are used (see e.g.,
[14,25]).
cr 1 for a point vortex; 3
cr jr
r00 j for an r-vortex; 4 tex we start with the electric eld distribution
 
jr
r00 j
cr tanh for a tanh-vortex: 5
rc
The r-vortex can also be written as
wx; y x
a iy rei/
a: 6 Fourier transformation of the light eld; secondly,
The tanh-vortex is interesting because it contains
the point vortex and the r-vortex as limiting cases
[25]. For a LaguerreGaussian background beam
with beam radius w the tanh-vortex behaves like a
point vortex for a core with rc  w. In the limit of
large values of rc the rst term in the expansion of
the tanh is jr
rrc00 j, i.e., it has the same radial depen-
dence as the r-vortex. In practice, the core radius
rc should be substantially larger than the beam ra-
dius w of the background beam. For a
LG01 and LG07 LaguerreGaussian beam which are
used in the experiments the condition is rc > 2w
and 4w, respectively.
It should be noted that the point vortex (Eq.
(3)) is unphysical and cannot be realised experi-
mentally. The term r-vortex (Eq. (4)) can be con-
fusing, since all generic free-space optical vortices
are locally of this type [4]. But this term is used
in the literature (see e.g., [14]). The r-vortex cannot
be realised experimentally, since the eld increases
to innity, but it is useful for describing the local
behaviour of the vortex. We have used the tanh-
vortex (Eq. (5)), because the extension of the
vortex core in our experiments is small compared
to the extension of the background beam and it
is most suitable to describe the experimental re-
sults. The most general case for the local structure
of a vortex is described in Refs. [26,27].
azimuthal index l = 0 and the radial index p 6 0
which have a maximum in the centre of the beam
[8,28]. The radial index p determines the number
of bright or dark rings in the radial intensity distri-
bution. The vortex is put into the background
beam by multiplying the vortex function with the
background eld.
2.2. Fourier transformation
In the calculation of the propagation of the vor-
E(x, y, 0) of the light in the plane z = 0, where z
is the propagation direction, and calculate the elec-
tric eld distribution E(x, y, z1) in the plane z = z1
(near eld distribution) [24]. This is done in the fol-
lowing way. Firstly, we make a two-dimensional
we multiply the Fourier transform with a propaga-
tion factor; thirdly, we perform an inverse Fourier
transformation back into real space, which yields
 F. Flossmann et al. / Optics Communications 250 (2005) 218230 221

the eld distribution in the plane z = z1. Normally Alp hf r; /; 0; LGlp r; /; 0i

this is done with numerical methods. However, the
advantage of r-vortices in LaguerreGaussian
beams is that the Fourier transformations can be
done analytically in the paraxial approximation,
saving computer time and yielding exact results,
e.g., for the number and position of vortices. The
far eld distribution (angular spectrum) is calcu-
lated by just performing one two-dimensional
Fourier transformation.
2.3. Expansion in LaguerreGaussian functions
Z 1 Z 2p
f  r; /; 0LGlp r; /; 0r dr d/: 13
0 0
The integral in Eq. (13) can be calculated analyti-
cally for an o-axis r-vortex with topological
charge m in a LaguerreGaussian LGlp back-
ground beam.
A simple closed-form analytical solution is
found for an on-axis r-vortex with charge m P 1
embedded in a LG0q background beam. We
write

LaguerreGaussian functions are a complete, f r; /; z LG0q r; /; zrm eim/ 14

orthogonal set of functions [8]. Therefore any
and get for the expansion coecients
function f(r,/,z) can be expanded in a series of s
LaguerreGaussian functions [29]. l pq w0
m
p m! m!
Ap
1 m
X 2 2 p! q
p!p m
q!
f r; /; z Alp LGlp r; /; z: 7
l;p for l m and q
m 6 p 6 q; 15

The LaguerreGaussian functions are given by [8] Alp 0; otherwise: 16

2 2

2r
i2Rkr ziUlp zil/ With this result and Eq. (6) we can calculate the
LGlp r; /; z C lp ew z k

 2 2l  2  expansion coecients for an o-axis r-vortex with

2r 2r charge m = 1 in a LG0q beam.
 Llp 2 : 8
2
w z w z For a discussion of the results we present two
examples, which are relevant for the experiments.
Here, Llp are the Laguerre polynomials, C lp is a nor-
malizing factor, w(z) is the beam radius, Rk(z) is 1. An initial o-axis r-vortex with topological
the radius of curvature of the phase surfaces and charge m = 1 embedded at r00 = (a,0) in a
Ulp z is the Gouy phase. w0 is the beam waist LaguerreGaussian LG01 beam, i.e., l = 0,
and zR kw20 =2 the Rayleigh range q = 1. In this case the beam can be written as
 1=2
1 2p! x
a iyLG01 r; /; z
C lp ; 9
wz pp l! w0

p LG10 r; /; z w0 LG11 r; /; z
  2
z2
w2 z w20 1 2 ; 10
aLG01 r; /; z: 17
zR
2. An initial o-axis r-vortex with topological
z2 z2R charge m = 1 in a LaguerreGaussian LG07
Rk z ; 11
z beam, i.e., l = 0, q = 7. The expansion of this
  function is given by
z
Ulp z 2p l 1 arctan : 12
zR
x
a iyLG07 r; /; z
The coecients Alp
of the expansion are calcu- r
7 1
lated in the plane z = 0 as the scalar product of
w0 LG r; /; z 2w0 LG17 r; /; z
the function f(r, /, 0) with the LaguerreGaussian 2 6
functions:
aLG07 r; /; z: 18
222 F. Flossmann et al. / Optics Communications 250 (2005) 218230

It turns out that the propagation dynamics is
determined by the z dependent Gouy phases (Eq.
(12)) of the LaguerreGaussian functions of the
expansion. The superposition of the Gouy phases
of the three LaguerreGaussian beams causes a
rotation of the phase structure, which determines
the azimuthal position of the vortices. The impor-
tance of the Gouy phase for the propagation of a
superposition of modes has been already empha-
sised by Siegman [8] and Nye [4]. It has been stud-
ied for self-imaging beams in Ref. [30].
3. Calculations for vortices with dierent cores in
dierent background beams
3.1. r-vortex inside the zero-intensity circle of a LG01
beam
In the following discussion the calculations
have been done with an initial o-axis r-vortex in
LaguerreGaussian background beams, because
the number of newly created vortices is lower than
for other vortex cores and it is possible to identify
them unambiguously. In addition, the propagation
dynamics is obtained by accurate and fast analyt-
ical calculations.
We start with the discussion of the interaction
of an o-axis vortex initially inside the zero-inten-
sity circle in the xy plane with the dislocation sur-
face of the LG01 beam, i.e., with the zero-amplitude
surface of the beam. The calculations have been
carried out for an r-vortex with a = 0.4w0
(w0 = 0.388 mm, zR = 75 cm) on the x-axis. The
original vortex with topological charge +1
destroys the non-generic dislocation surface of the
LG01 beam. Fig. 1(a) shows in a three-dimensional
view that at a distance z = 214.6 cm a new disloca-
tion line in U-shape (dark grey) is created in addi-
tion to the dislocation line (light grey) originating
from the initial vortex. Both lines correspond to
mixed edge-screw dislocations. For large distances
(z > 700 cm) these lines become in a good approx-
imation screw dislocation lines because they are
nearly parallel to the propagation direction z.
The intersection points of the lines with planes per-
pendicular to the z-axis correspond to vortices
with topological charge +1 of the original vortex
and +1 and
1 of the newly-created vortices.
The total topological charge is conserved.

Fig. 1. Calculated propagation dynamics of an initial o-axis r-vortex (m = 1) in a LG01 background beam (w0 = 0.388 mm,
zR = 75 cm). (a) a = 0.4w0, (b) a = 0.9w0, (c) a = 1.2 w0. Base plane: initial intensity distribution in the normalised coordinate system
x/w
y/w. Top plane: trajectories of the vortices. The dotted curve represents the zero-intensity circle of the initial LG01 beam. In
between: three-dimensional dislocation lines. Light grey curve: dislocation line of initial vortex; dark grey curves: newly-created
dislocation lines. The dierent ordinate scale in (b) should be noted.
 F. Flossmann et al. / Optics Communications 250 (2005) 218230
The projections of the dislocation lines into the
x-y plane normalised to w(z) are shown on top of
Fig. 1(a). The zero-intensity circle of the initial
LG01 beam is represented by the dotted curve. In
the following we use again the term motion of
the vortex for characterising the change of the po-
sition of the vortex in successive planes perpendic-
ular to the propagation direction z, which actually
describes the geometry of the three-dimensional
vortex lines. After a short propagation distance z
of the light beam the outer vortices move approx-
imately on circles in opposite directions in the nor-
malised xy plane because of their dierent charge,
similar to vortices in a Gaussian beam. The origi-
nal inner vortex however moves in the representa-
tion with normalised transverse coordinates
towards the centre of the beam.
The trajectories of the vortices, in particular the
inward motion of the initial inner vortex (Fig. 1(a),
top) are explained in Ref. [31] using a model in
which the phase and intensity gradients of the
background beam cause the motion of the vortex
[1417].
3.2. r-vortex outside the zero-intensity circle of a
LG01 beam
We have carried out calculations for an r-vortex
initially outside the zero-intensity circle of the LG01
mode. In this case additional dislocation lines are
created immediately for z > 0 by breaking the non-
generic phase dislocation surface of the LG01 beam.
Three-dimensional pictures of the dislocation lines
are shown in Fig. 1(b) and (c) in coordinates norma-
lised to w(z) for an initial distance of the vortex from
the centre of 0.9w0 and 1.2w0, respectively.
p For a po-
sition of the initial vortex of w0 = 2 < a < w0 (Fig.
1(b)) the dislocation line (light grey) starting at the
position of this vortex has an inverted U-shape,
while the new dislocation line (dark grey) continues
to the far eld. After some propagation distance a
new U-shaped dislocation line is created (see Fig.
1(b)). Therefore, one vortex or three vortices are ob-
served in planes perpendicular to the propagation
direction z. For a position of the initial vortex of
a > w0 three dislocation lines are observed from
the beginning to the far eld (see Fig. 1(c)). On top
of Fig. 1(c) the projection of the dislocation lines
223
into the normalised xy plane is shown. The original
vortex and one of the new vortices move after a
short distance approximately on a circle, while the
other new vortex moves to the y axis with decreasing
distance to the centre.
3.3. Comparison for a LG01 beam
A comparison of the dynamics of initialpvortices
inside the zero-intensity circle a < w0 = 2 and
outside the beam waist (a > w0) in the representa-
tion, where the x and y coordinates are normalised
to the beam diameter w(z) shows the following two
main dierences.
1. An initially inside vortex moves to a point close
to the centre on the y/w(z) axis (Fig. 1(a), top).
When the initial vortex is outside, it propagates
on a quarter circle to the y/w(z)-axis (Fig. 1(c),
top).
2. When the initial vortex is inside the zero-
intensity circle, one new three-dimensional dis-
location line in U-shape, corresponding to two
vortices in a plane, is created at a distance zn,
which is the larger the smaller the o-axis dis-
tance a of the initial vortex is (Fig. 1(a)).
When the initial vortex is outside the beam
waist, two new independent three-dimensional
dislocation lines are created immediately in
the beginning of the propagation (for z > 0)
(Fig. 1(c)).
For a discussion of this dierent behaviour, we
have plotted the zero-curves of the real and imag-
inary parts of the eld at propagation distances
z = 0 and 3 cm for two examples: a = 1.2w0 and
a = 0.4w0 in Fig. 2. On the zero-intensity circle at
z = 0 cm both the real and imaginary part of the
light eld are zero. In order to distinguish between
them the light grey circle for the real part has been
plotted at z = 0 cm (Fig. 2(a) and (c)) slightly smal-
ler than the dark grey circle of the imaginary part.
For the initial outside vortex V (Fig. 2(a)) the
two crossings of the dark grey zero-circle and the
dark grey zero-line along the x-axis at z = 0 cm
are avoided for z > 0 (Fig. 2(b)). Due to the
destruction of the dislocation surface two cross-
ings V1 and V2 of the zero-curves of the real and
224 F. Flossmann et al. / Optics Communications 250 (2005) 218230

Fig. 2. Zero-curves of the real and imaginary parts of the electric eld of an initially o-axis vortex in a LG01 beam. On the zero-
intensity circle at z = 0 cm ((a) and (c)) both the real and imaginary part of the light eld are zero. In order to distinguish between them
the light grey circle for the real part has been plotted slightly smaller than the dark grey circle of the imaginary part. Initial shift a of the
vortex and propagation distance z: (a) a = 1.2w0, z = 0 cm; (b) a = 1.2w0, z=3 cm; (c) a = 0.4w0, z = 0 cm; (d) a = 0.4w0, z=3 cm. V is the
initial vortex. The newly created vortices V1 and V2 are marked by circles.

imaginary parts (light and dark grey curves,
respectively), corresponding to two vortices,
appear immediately. For the initially inside vortex
V (Fig. 2(c)) there is not only an avoided crossing
of the zeros of the imaginary part (dark grey
curves), but also of the zeros of the real part (light
grey circle and vertical line) of the eld (see Fig.
2(d)). As a consequence, in the beginning of the
propagation there are no additional crossings of
the zero-curves of the real and imaginary parts
and the new vortices are created at larger
distances.
separate dislocation lines per dislocation surface,
corresponding to two vortices with opposite
charge in a plane. Finally, in total 2p + 1 vortices
are observed and the total charge is conserved.
We have calculated the trajectories of the vortices
for the example of a LG07 beam in the normalised
xy plane and found that almost all of the vortices
move approximately on circles to the y/w(z) axis
except the innermost, which moves to the beam
center. They reach the y/w(z) axis in the far eld.
3.5. Dierent vortex cores

3.4. r-vortex in a LG0p beam (p > 1)
Calculations of the interaction of an initial
r-vortex in higher order LG0p beams (p > 1) with
p dislocation surfaces have shown the following re-
sults. An r-vortex in a LaguerreGaussian LG0p
background beam disturbs the phase dislocation
surfaces of the beam and produces one three-
dimensional U-shaped dislocation line or two
We have also carried out calculations for point
vortices and vortices with a tanh(r/rc)-core. It
should be emphasised that the tanh-vortex is espe-
cially interesting, because the variation of the core
diameter rc provides also the limiting cases of a
point vortex and an r-vortex in a good approxima-
tion (last paragraph of Section 2.1). The general
result of the calculations is that an initial narrow
tanh-vortex or a point vortex generates more
 F. Flossmann et al. / Optics Communications 250 (2005) 218230
Fig. 3. LG07 background beam with an initial o-axis tanh-
vortex (rc = 0.2 mm) at a propagation distance of z = 30 cm
(corresponding to Fig. 7(D)). Central part of the calculated
zero-curves of the real and imaginary parts of the light eld.
The crossings of the light and dark grey curves correspond to
vortices. Some vortices are marked by circles.
new vortices than an r-vortex. Fig. 3 shows as an
example a LG07 background beam. For clarity only
the central part of the zero-curves of the real and
imaginary parts of an initial tanh-vortex with nar-
row core (rc = 0.2 mm) in a LG07 beam is given at a
propagation distance of z = 30 cm (corresponding
to the experimental situation in Fig. 7(D)). One
vortex V is clearly seen. A closer inspection of
the gure shows additional very at crossings of
the light and dark grey zero-curves of the real
and imaginary parts of the electric eld, represent-
ing non-canonical vortices. To simplify identica-
tion of these vortices, we have marked eight of
them by circles. Further vortices are created during
propagation to larger distances.
Finally, we would like to discuss the dier-
ences between a narrow tanh-vortex (correspond-
ing approximately to a point vortex) and an
r-vortex or a tanh-vortex with broad core in a
LG beam. The disturbance by the strong dirac-
tion of the narrow tanh-vortex (or the point
vortex) leads to the generation of many non-
canonical vortices, but causes a rather small shift
225
of the zero-curves of the real and imaginary
parts (see e.g., Fig. 3) of the non-generic phase
dislocations of the background beam. This
means that the non-generic dislocation surfaces
are partially maintained in a good approxima-
tion. The eect of diraction of the r-vortex is
negligible, but the disturbance of the phase dislo-
cations is much stronger. Therefore, the disloca-
tion surfaces are completely destroyed and a
well-dened number of vortices is created (2p
vortices for a LG0p background beam).
3.6. Dierent background beams
There exist many light beams which have non-
generic dislocation surfaces, on which the real
and imaginary parts of the light eld are zero.
Examples are shape-invariant beams like Her-
miteGaussian beams [8] and InceGaussian
beams [9,10] and propagation-invariant beams like
Bessel [11], Mathieu [12,13] and parabolic [32]
beams.
A theoretical analysis of the above mentioned
shape-invariant beams has shown, that, similar
to LaguerreGaussian beams, an initial o-axis
r-vortex creates two vortices of opposite charge
per dislocation surface in a plane perpendicular
to the propagation direction. This has been dem-
onstrated as follows. Each of these beams can be
represented by an expansion into Laguerre
Gaussian beams [8,10]. Therefore, each beam
can be written as a Gaussian envelope and a
polynomial in x and y of degree d = 2p. The
insertion of an o-axis r-vortex with topological
charge 1 increases the overall polynomial degree
by 1. Performing Fourier transformations on this
function (as described in Section 2.2), does not
change its polynomial degree, so there are up to
2p + 1 vortices for z > 0 and in the far eld of
the beam, similar to a LaguerreGaussian LG0p
beam.
For propagation-invariant beams the analysis
is complicated. But we expect also that an initial
o-axis vortex with broad core creates two vorti-
ces of opposite charge per dislocation surface.
This has been shown for a special case of a qua-
si-propagation-invariant beam [23]. The propaga-
tion dynamics of an initial J1-Bessel beam with
226 F. Flossmann et al. / Optics Communications 250 (2005) 218230
r-vortex in the centre, which was o-axis with re-
spect to the Gaussian envelope, was calculated
analytically. It was shown that two vortices are
created per dislocation surface of the Bessel beam
[23].
The evolution of the intensity distribution of
high order LaguerreGaussian beams with an
o-axis vortex (see Section 5.3) is remarkable sim-
ilar to that of a Bessel beam with o-axis vortex
[11] despite the fact that the phase and far-eld
intensity distribution of both beams are completely
dierent.
4. Experimental setup
For the experimental observation of vortices in
dierent planes perpendicular to the propagation
direction we use the setup shown in Fig. 4. The
diameter (2w0 = 1.1 mm) of a HeNe laser beam is
increased by telescope T1 consisting of lenses L1
and L2 to a diameter of 18.3 mm. After passing
the aperture B1 with diameter 4 mm it illuminates
an amplitude grating G1 for the production of La-
guerreGaussian beams as described in [28]. The
amplitude grating is positioned at the beam waist
and only introduces the p phase jumps at the
zero-intensity curves of the LG modes. It thus
generates a superposition of several modes with
dierent beam waists which all have one of their
zero-intensity curves at this position. If the ratio
of the diameter of the innermost circular p phase
jump in the grating and the diameter of the illumi-
nating beam is adjusted to 2 by use of the aper-
ture B1, the LG01 component in the superposition
Fig. 4. Experimental setup. HeNe laser; T1, T2 telescopes
consisting of lenses L1, L2, L3, L4 with focal lengths 1.2, 20,
100, 30 cm, respectively; B1, B2 apertures; G1 amplitude
grating; G2 phase grating; CCD camera.
reaches over 80% [28]. In the case of the LG07 beam
the diameter ratio for the highest eciency is 4.
Directly behind the grating G1 we use a 4-level
phase grating G2 for the production of a narrow
(rc = 0.15 mm) vortex of topological charge
m = 1. The telescope T2 consisting of lenses L3
and L4 is then used to separate the refraction or-
ders of the gratings by aperture B2 and to adjust
the diameter of the beam waist and the divergence
of the beam. The beam intensity is observed with a
CCD camera behind the back focal plane of lens
L4, in which the Gouy phase shift of the beam is
zero and the vortex is relative to the beam still at
its initial position. In the experiments we measure
the intensity distribution of the beam in successive
planes perpendicular to the propagation direction
z. Therefore, we use the terminology for vortices
in planes, e.g., vortex motion, interaction (see Sec-
tion 1).
5. Experimental results
5.1. Vortex outside the zero-intensity circle of a LG01
beam
We start with the simplest case of a vortex in a
LaguerreGaussian beam LG01 , which has one
non-generic edge dislocation surface. In the begin-
ning at z = 0 the vortex is localised at the point
r00 = (a,0), with a = 1.0 w0 (w0 = 0.388 mm, Ray-
leigh range zR = 75 cm), i.e., at the bright ring.
Fig. 5 presents the intensity patterns at dierent
propagation distances z. The last column shows
the intensity in the far eld. The x and y coordi-
nates of the intensity patterns are normalised to
the beam diameter w(z) at the respective distance
z. The experimental results, the calculated results
for a tanh-vortex (rc = 0.15 mm) and an r-vortex
are shown in rows 1, 2, and 3, respectively. In
the calculated pictures the zeros of the imaginary
and real parts of the light eld are shown as dark
and light grey curves, respectively. The crossing
points of these curves correspond to the positions
of vortices.
There is good agreement between the experi-
mental (row 1) and the calculated intensity pic-
tures (row 2). We nd only minor dierences
 F. Flossmann et al. / Optics Communications 250 (2005) 218230 227

Fig. 5. Propagation dynamics of an o-axis vortex (m = 1, a = 1.0w0) in a LG01 background beam (w0 = 0.388 mm, zR = 75 cm). First
row: measured intensity distributions; second and third row: calculated intensity distributions for a tanh-vortex (rc = 0.15 mm) and an
r-vortex, respectively. Propagation distances: (A) z = 0 cm, (B) 30 cm, (C) 60 cm, (D) 90 cm, (E) far eld. The light and dark grey
curves correspond to the zeros of the real and imaginary part of the light eld. The closely spaced light and dark grey curves in the
margin of (b), (c), and (d) are artifacts of the numerical calculations. The boxes have a width of approximately 8.5w0.

between the calculated intensity patterns for a

tanh-vortex (with rc = 0.15 mm) and an r-vortex
(rows 2 and 3, respectively). However, the problem
with intensity patterns is that it is dicult to see
enough details. Therefore we included the calcu-
lated curves of the zeros of the imaginary and real
parts of the eld, to show the exact positions of the
vortices.
In various papers [1820,29] vortices are identi-
ed by performing interference experiments. How-
ever, in the case of LaguerreGaussian beams the
unequivocal interpretation of interference pictures
is dicult. Problems in the localization of vortex
points investigated with interferometric methods
have been discussed in Ref. [33]. Fig. 6(a) and
(b) show as an example the measured intensity dis-
tribution at z = 60 cm (same as in Fig. 5(C)) and
the calculated zero-curves of the real and imagi-
nary parts of the eld, respectively. In the center
of the beam ve crossings V1V5 of the dark Fig. 6. Intensity distributions at a propagation distance
z = 60 cm (corresponding to Fig. 5(C)). (a) Measured intensity
and light grey curves, corresponding to vortices, distribution. (b) Calculated zero-curves of the real and imag-
are seen. The very at crossings V2 and V3 lie in inary part of the eld. (c) Calculated interference pattern,
a dark zone and it is practically not possible to (d) measured overexposed intensity distribution.
228 F. Flossmann et al. / Optics Communications 250 (2005) 218230

identify them in the experiments. In this region the
initial edge dislocation surface is retained in a
good approximation. Vortices V1, V4 and V5
can be principally identied in interference pic-
tures. However, inspection of Fig. 6(c), where the
calculated interference pictures corresponding to
Fig. 6(a) are given, shows that it is dicult to lo-
cate these vortices. Therefore, we did not carry
out interference experiments.
We have tried to identify the vortices V1, V4
and V5 from overexposed intensity pictures. In
Fig. 6(d) the overexposed measured intensity dis-
tribution corresponding to the case of Fig. 6(a) is
shown. The dark spots representing the vortices
V1, V4 and V5 are clearly seen. Their positions
in the measured intensity distribution are in good
agreement with the positions of the calculated
crossings of the dark and light grey curves. Similar
results have been obtained in the comparison be-
tween experiments and calculations at various
propagation distances.
The crossings of the dark and light grey zero
curves in Fig. 5 show that during propagation
additional vortices are created. For example, there
are four vortices in addition to the initial narrow
tanh-vortex (Fig. 5(c) and (d)) and two vortices
in addition to the initial r-vortex (Fig. 5 (c)(
)).
The reason for this dierence is the stronger dif-
fraction [21] of the narrow tanh-vortex, which
leads to more crossings of the zero-curves of the
real and imaginary parts of the eld. There is a fur-
ther dierence between the development of the
beam with an initial narrow tanh-vortex and r-vor-
tex. The tanh-vortex represents a weaker distur-
bance of the non-generic edge dislocation than
the r-vortex. Therefore the dark and light grey zero
curves are practically not separated by the tanh-
vortex along the lower part of the zero-intensity
circle (Fig. 5(b) and (c)), i.e., this part of the
non-generic edge dislocation surface survives in a
good approximation.
5.2. Vortex inside the zero-intensity circle of a LG01
beam
We have done experiments with a vortex in a
LaguerreGaussian LG01 beam located at
a = 0.6w0 (w0 = 0.388 mm), i.e., just inside the
zero-intensity circle. During propagation from
z = 070 cm a small part of the initial zero-inten-
sity circle of the LG01 background beam gets
bright and a dark spot, corresponding to the
initial vortex, is observed. In the xy plane the
vortex moves away from the x-axis, rst towards
the y-axis and then parallel to the y-axis to the
periphery of the beam. In the xy plane norma-
lised to the beam diameter w(z) this vortex
moves away from the x/w-axis and approaches

Fig. 7. Propagation dynamics of an initial o-axis vortex (m = 1, a = 0.9w0) in a LG07 background beam (w0 = 0.48 mm, zR = 114 cm).
First row: measured intensity distribution. Second row: calculated intensity distribution for a tanh-vortex (rc = 0.2 mm). Propagation
distances: (A) z = 0 cm, (B) 7cm, (C) 15 cm, (D) 30 cm, (E) 70 cm. The boxes have a width of approximately 8w0.
 F. Flossmann et al. / Optics Communications 250 (2005) 218230
a point on the y/w-axis close to the centre of the
beam (see top of Fig. 1(a)). The behaviour of
this vortex in the LG01 beam is in contrast to
that of a vortex in a Gaussian beam, which
moves in the xy plane on a straight line parallel
to the y-axis outwards and in the normalised xy
plane on a quarter circle to the y-axis. We dis-
cussed this motion in detail in Ref. [31]. The
measured intensity patterns at dierent distances
z were in good agreement with that calculated
for a tanh-vortex.
5.3. Vortex in a LG07 beam
In Fig. 7 the results for a LG07 background
beam with a vortex at position r00 = (a,0), with
a = 0.9w0 (w0 = 0.48 mm, zR = 114 cm), i.e., on
the second bright ring of the LG07 beam, are pre-
sented for dierent propagation distances z. The
rst and second row show the experimental results
and the calculated intensity distribution for a tanh-
vortex (rc = 0.2 mm), respectively. The measured
and calculated intensity pictures agree very well.
In the beginning of the propagation range a dark
spot is observed on the second bright ring (Fig.
7(A) and 1). During propagation a bright or dark
spiral is formed, the ends of which move along the
x-axis in opposite directions, one to the beam cen-
ter and the other outwards (Fig. 7(B) and (C)). In
this way the number of windings of the spiral
increases. When the inner end of the spiral has
reached the beam centre (Fig. 7(D)), a vortex is left
in the centre and the end of the spiral changes its
orientation by 180. Then it propagates away from
the centre and the winding number decreases (Fig.
7(E)).
6. Conclusions
In this paper, the propagation dynamics of vor-
tices with dierent types of core functions (point,
tanh, r) in LaguerreGaussian background beams
was investigated. The intensity distributions of a
narrow initial o-axis vortex with topological
charge 1 in LG01 and LG07 background beams were
measured at dierent propagation distances and
found to be in good agreement with calculations.
229
The electric eld distribution was calculated with
two methods, one using Fourier transformation
and the other expansion in terms of the orthogonal
set of LaguerreGaussian functions.
The interaction of an o-axis r-vortex with a
LG01 beam was calculated for three cases: the
vortex initially inside the zero-intensity circle of
the beam, in between the zero-intensity circle
and the beam waist and outside the beam waist.
When the vortex was initially inside, after some
propagation distance, which depends on the dis-
tance of the initial vortex from the beam center,
a U-shaped three-dimensional dislocation line
appears corresponding to two new vortices in
planes perpendicular to the propagation direc-
tion. In contrast, for a vortex initially outside
the beam waist two separate new dislocation
lines are formed immediately for z > 0 and
extend to the far eld region. When the initial
vortex is in between the zero-intensity circle
and the beam waist, the situation is more com-
plex. At z > 0 rst a new dislocation line and
an inverted U-shape dislocation line (with one
end at the initial vortex) are observed. Later at
larger distances a U-shaped dislocation line is
created. The newly-created vortices are often dif-
cult to observe experimentally, because they are
in regions of very low intensity.
We have calculated the propagation dynamics
of a narrow tanh-vortex and compared it with an
r-vortex in a LaguerreGaussian background
beam. Due to the strong diraction of the narrow
vortex the number of newly-created vortices in a
plane is larger than for an r-vortex, which gener-
ates p pairs of oppositely charged vortices in a La-
guerreGaussian LG0p beam. The original
dislocation surfaces of the LaguerreGaussian
beam are partially maintained in a good approxi-
mation, when a narrow vortex is embedded. But
they are completely destroyed by an r-vortex.
We have also considered other background
beams with non-generic dislocation surfaces, e.g.,
HermiteGaussian, InceGaussian, Bessel and
Mathieu beams. Similar to a LG background
beam we expect an initial o-axis vortex to destroy
the dislocation surfaces and create at least two vor-
tices per surface in a plane perpendicular to the
propagation direction.
230 F. Flossmann et al. / Optics Communications 250 (2005) 218230
Acknowledgements
The authors thank Dr. S. Sogomonian for his
contributions in the initial phase of this work.
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