Topological aberration of optical vortex beams and singularimetry of dielectric interfaces

Abstract

The splitting of a high-order optical vortex into a constellation of unit vortices, upon total reflection, is described and analyzed. The vortex constellation generalizes, in a local sense, the familiar longitudinal Goos-Hänchen and transverse Imbert-Federov shifts of the centroid of a reflected optical beam. The centroid shift is related to the centre of the constellation, whose geometry otherwise depends on higher-order terms in an expansion of the reflection matrix. We present an approximation of the field around the constellation of increasing order as an Appell sequence of complex polynomials whose roots are the vortices, and explain the results by an analogy with the theory of optical aberration.