We demonstrate the Fourier relationship between angular position and angular momentum for a light mode. In particular we measure the distribution of orbital angular momentum states of light that has passed through an aperture and verify that the orbital angular momentum distribution is given by the complex Fourier-transform of the aperture function. We use spatial light modulators, configured a...

A circularly polarized paraxial Gaussian laser beam carries ±h̄ angular momentum per photon as spin, with zero orbital angular momentum. Focusing the beam with a rotationally symmetric lens cannot change this angular momentum flux, yet the focused beam must have spin |Sz | < h̄ per photon. The remainder of the original spin is converted to orbital angular momentum, manifesting itself as a longitu...

We present a brief introduction to the orbital angular momentum of light, the subject of our theme issue and, in particular, to the developments in the 13 years following the founding paper by Allen et al. (Allen et al. 1992 Phys. Rev. A 45, 8185 (doi:10.1103/PhysRevA.45.8185)). The papers by our invited authors serve to bring the field up to date and suggest where developments may take us next...

The modern field of optical angular momentum began with the realisation by Allen et al in 1992 that, in addition to the spin associated with polarisation, light beams with helical phase fronts carry orbital angular momentum. There has been much confusion and debate, however, surrounding the intricacies of the field and, in particular, the separation of the angular momentum into its spin and orb...

We demonstrate the optical orbital angular momentum conservation during the transfer process from subwavelength plasmonic vortex lens (PVLs) to light and the generating process of surface plasmon polaritons (SPPs). Illuminating plasmonic vortex lenses with beams carrying optical orbital angular momentum, the SP vortices with orbital angular momentum were generated and inherit the optical angula...

One property of electromagnetic waves that has been recently explored is the ability to multiplex multiple beams, such that each beam has a unique helical phase front. The amount of phase front 'twisting' indicates the orbital angular momentum state number, and beams with different orbital angular momentum are orthogonal. Such orbital angular momentum based multiplexing can potentially increase...

The evolution of orbital angular momentum distributions within the radiative parton model is studied. We use different scenarios for the helicity weighted parton distributions and consider a broad range of input distributions for orbital angular momentum. In all cases we are lead to the conclusion that the absolute value of the average orbital angular momentum per parton peaks at relatively lar...