Physics and Astronomy Colloquium
Generation, Detection and Application of Twisted Waves of Light and Quantum Particles
4:00 pm –
5:00 pm
Theodore Jorgensen Hall
Room: 136
Target Audiences:
855 N 16th St
Lincoln NE 68588
Lincoln NE 68588
Additional Info: JH
Contact:
Physics Department, (402) 472-2770, paoffice2@unl.edu
Dr. Charles Clark will present his topic, “Generation, Detection and Application of Twisted Waves of Light and Quantum Particles,” in-person.
Dislocations in wave trains were manifest in the 1830s studies of ocean tides by William Whewell, who discovered “amphidromic points” in the sea, where there is no tidal motion. John Nye and Michael Berry’s 1970s investigations, of fine structure in radio echoes from the bottom of the Antarctic ice sheet, revealed wavefront dislocation as a generic phenomenon of wave motion. In the early 1990s “orbital angular momentum states” of light were produced, and during the following thirty years similar realizations were made in beams of atoms, molecules. x-rays, electrons and neutrons. I will discuss these phenomena from a simple wave-equation perspective and address possible applications.
Dislocations in wave trains were manifest in the 1830s studies of ocean tides by William Whewell, who discovered “amphidromic points” in the sea, where there is no tidal motion. John Nye and Michael Berry’s 1970s investigations, of fine structure in radio echoes from the bottom of the Antarctic ice sheet, revealed wavefront dislocation as a generic phenomenon of wave motion. In the early 1990s “orbital angular momentum states” of light were produced, and during the following thirty years similar realizations were made in beams of atoms, molecules. x-rays, electrons and neutrons. I will discuss these phenomena from a simple wave-equation perspective and address possible applications.