Vectorial flower gardens and wind roses -- tailoring the polarization of light

Only recently, so called Poincaré beams¹ containing spatially varying polarization have regained significant scientific interest: These fields reveal beneficial properties with respect to high-NA focusing or energy flow, which enable advanced applications in high-resolution imaging or optical trapping. Furthermore, the customization of polarization is essential to experimentally access fundamental concepts of singular optics², which till now, still poses a challenge. Implementing a versatile and flexible experimental system we break new ground to create novel, sophisticated families of Poincaré beams including complex polarization singularity structures. Besides higher-order singularities in beams of tailored and even hybrid shape¹, we demonstrate complex singularity lattices in extended polarization networks. We realize linearly polarized networks resembling flower gardens or ellipse fields similar to wind roses. These spatially-resolved structures enable the investigation of fundamental questions of singular optics and pave the way to advanced optical micromanipulation. ¹Otte E et al. 2016 J. Opt. 18 074012 ²Dennis MR et al. 2009 Progress in Optics 53 (Elsevier) ch5 293