Singularities splitting phenomenon for the superposition of hybrid orders structured lights and the corresponding interference discrimination method

Abstract

Abstract It is the basic characteristic of pure vortex light that there is a phase singularity at the origin. Such a singularity may be multiple degenerate, which determines the order of vortex light. Singularities splitting phenomenon means that singularities no longer concentrate at the origin but distribute around the space, usually occurring in impure vortex light. In this paper, we demonstrate the singularities splitting phenomenon and propose an analysis method, based on which one may rapidly estimate the modal components of impure vortex light. As two common singularity discrimination methods, the spiral and fork wire interference patterns are compared in distinguishing splitting singularities. The most widely used spiral interference pattern is revealed to be the worst form because of the low resolution. Instead, the fork wire interference pattern is with higher and easily adjusted resolution. 1‰ impurity is still able to be distinguished through fork wire interference patterns in the experiment.