Speaker
Description
The rapid development of optical technologies, including optical manipulation and trapping, data processing, sensing and metrology, advanced imaging and microscopy, as well as classical and quantum communications, necessitates the exploration of new degrees of freedom for structuring light in space and time beyond conventional control of amplitude, phase, and polarization. Topological particle-like objects in structured optical fields have emerged as promising candidates for such degrees of freedom. In particular, these optical topologies offer new capabilities for communication, imaging, and sensing through atmospheric turbulence, where refractive index fluctuations distort phase, polarization, and field structure. In this talk, we discuss structured light and darkness, including optical beams with an orbital angular momentum, knotted singularities, and optical skyrmions, and demonstrate their generation, propagation, and interactions with matter in linear and nonlinear regimes. Using metasurfaces and metamaterials, we achieve subwavelength control of optical fields and topology imprinting at fundamental and harmonic frequencies, and introduce spatiotemporal approaches for structuring light jointly in space and time.