Numerical and analytical models for calculating optical forces near auxiliary plasmonic substrates

Alexander S. Shalin, Aliaksandra Ivinskaya, Natalia Kostina, Mihail I. Petrov, Andrey A. Bogdanov, Sergei Sukhov, and Pavel Ginzburg

The optical force acting on a nanoparticle near a planar substrate is governed by incident light and excitation of surface and volume modes of the substrate. The realization of negative optical forces (“tractor beams”) via propagating plasmon-polaritones and volume modes will be shown and considered in detail on the basis of the described analytical and numerical models for certain types of anisotropic substrates. In addition, optical tweezers performance is investigated when the Gaussian beam is focused on the metal substrate with nanoparticle. When the beam is focused above the substrate optical force increases about an order of magnitude due to evanescent field of surface plasmon. Novel effect of repulsion from Gaussian beam (“anti-trapping”) is obtained when the beam waist is moved below the substrate which is confirmed by both the analytical approach and finite element simulation.

DOI

A technique to calibrate spatial light modulator for varying phase response over its spatial regions

Deepak K. Gupta, B. V. R. Tata, and T. R. Ravindran
Holographic Optical Tweezers (HOTs) employ the technique of beam shaping and holography in an optical manipulation system to create a multitude of focal spots for simultaneous trapping and manipulation of sub-microscopic particles. The beam shaping is accomplished by the use of a phase only liquid crystal spatial light modulator (SLM). The efficiency and the uniformity in the generated traps greatly depend on the phase response behavior of SLMs. In addition the SLMs are found to show different phase response over its different spatial regions, due to non-flat structure of SLMs. Also the phase responses are found to vary over different spatial regions due to non-uniform illumination (Gaussian profile of incident laser). There are various techniques to calibrate for the varying phase response by characterizing the phase modulation at various sub-sections. We present a simple and fast technique to calibrate the SLM suffering with spatially varying phase response. We divide the SLM into many sub-sections and optimize the brightness and gamma of each sub-section for maximum diffraction efficiency. This correction is incorporated in the Weighted Gerchberg Saxton (WGS) algorithm for generation of holograms.

DOI

Setting up of holographic optical tweezer arrays

Deepak K. Gupta, B. V. R. Tata, and T. R. Ravindran

Optical tweezers use tightly focused laser beams to hold and move microscopic objects in a solvent. However, many applications require simultaneous control over multitude of particles, positioning them in 3D space at desired locations with desired symmetry, which is made possible by the use of holographic optical tweezers using the technique of beam shaping and holography. We have designed and developed a holographic optical tweezer set-up using a phase only liquid crystal, reflective spatial light modulator. We employ the technique of phase modulation to modulate the phase of the beam by generating holograms using Random Superposition (RS) and weighted Gerchberg Saxton algorithm (WGS) algorithm for generating desired patterns of light at the trapping plane. A 4×4 array of beams with square symmetry was generated using WGS algorithm and trapped polystyrene particles of size 1.2 micron in a 4×4 two dimensional array. There were uniformity issues among the trap intensities, as we move away from the zeroth order spot. This was corrected by taking into account diffraction effects due to the pixelated nature of SLM modulating the intensity of the trap spots and the ghost order suppression by spatial disorder.

DOI