Simultaneous measurement of spin and precession based on light’s orbital angular momentum

Abstract

The rotational Doppler effect of the vortex beam is a recently emerged promising application of the optical vortex with orbital angular momentum. In this paper, we combine the method of the micro-Doppler effect of the traditional radar and the rotational Doppler effect of the vortex beam and propose an approach of rotational micro-Doppler effect, realizing the simultaneous measurement of spin and precession. We firstly analyze the rotational micro-Doppler characteristic introduced by precession under the illuminating of vortex beam and calculate the rotational micro-Doppler parameters related to the spin and precession. Then we conduct an experiment of using the vortex beam to detect a spinning object with precession and the rotational micro-Doppler frequency is successfully observed. By extracting the rotational micro-Doppler parameters, the simultaneous and independent measurement of spin and precession is realized. Both the theoretical analysis and experimental results indicate that the rotational micro-Doppler effect is an effective extension of the rotational Doppler effect and is also a feasible application of the vortex beam detection.