We report that light beams, guided along liquid crystal defect lines, can be transformed into vector beams with various polarization profiles. Using finite-difference time-domain numerical solving of Maxwell equations, we confirm that the defect in the orientational order of the liquid crystal induces a defect in the light field with twice the winding number of the liquid crystal defect, coupli...

Spatially-variant photonic crystals (SVPCs), in which the orientation of the unit cell changes as a function of position, are shown to be capable of abruptly controlling light beams using just low index materials and can be made to have high polarization selectivity. Multi-photon direct laser writing in the photo-polymer SU-8 was used to fabricate three-dimensional SVPCs that direct the flow of...

Details of light depolarization in turbid media were investigated using polarization-sensitive Monte Carlo simulations. The surviving linear and circular polarization fractions of photons undergoing a particular number of scattering events were studied for different optical properties of the turbid media. It was found that the threshold number of photon scattering interactions that fully random...

Non-separable superpositions of polarization and spatial mode of a single photon produce a state that has a polarization that depends on the transverse position, and contains all states of polarization represented on the Poincaré sphere. We have done measurements of the space-dependent state of polarization of single photons prepared in distinct 2×2 (qubit-qubit) and 2×3 (qubit-qutrit) non-sepa...

The backscattering of circularly polarized light at normal incidence to a half-space of scattering particles is studied using the Electric Field Monte Carlo (EMC) method. The spatial distribution of the backscattered light intensity is examined for both the timeresolved and continuous wave cases for large particles with anisotropy factor, g, in the range 0.8 to 0.97. For the time-resolved case,...

Measurements of the underwater polarized light field were performed at different stations, atmospheric conditions, and water compositions using a newly developed hyperspectral and multiangular polarimeter during a recent cruise in the coastal areas of New York Harbor Sandy Hook, NJ region. Angular and spectral variations of the degree of polarization are found to be consistent with theory. Maxi...