Self-focusing transmittances.

In this Letter, we describe the optical field associated with transmittances characterized by a slit-shaped curve. The influence of the curvature is that the diffraction field generates focusing regions. The focusing geometry corresponds to the geometry of the transmittance curve, except for scaling, rotations or translations. A relevant point is that the changes in the morphology of the diffraction field are bounded by the focusing regions. Our experimental and computational results are in good agreement with the theoretical predictions.

The van Cittert-Zernike theorem for electromagnetic fields.

The van Cittert-Zernike theorem, well known for the scalar optical fields, is generalized for the case of vector electromagnetic fields. The deduced theorem shows that the degree of coherence of the electromagnetic field produced by the completely incoherent vector source increases on propagation whereas the degree of polarization remains unchanged. The possible application of the deduced theorem is illustrated by an example of optical simulation of partially coherent and partially polarized secondary source with the controlled statistical properties.

Modulation of coherence and polarization using liquid crystal spatial light modulators.

We propose a method for modulation of coherence and polarization of electromagnetic fields, employing two crossed zero-twisted nematic liquid crystal spatial light modulators. In contrast to a similar technique analyzed by Shirai and Wolf [J. Opt. Soc. Am A, 21, 1907, (2004)] our method provides a wide range simultaneous modulation of coherence and polarization. The dependence of the obtained results on different definitions of electromagnetic coherence is considered.

Generation of partially coherent diffraction-free fields with tunable geometry.

The synthesis of diffraction-free fields with different profiles is described. The synthesis is done by illuminating a screen containing a circular slit with a cosine beam. The treatment is equivalent to the modulation of the slit transfer characteristics and makes possible a tunable interference interaction of Bessel beams with noncommon axes. These results are generalized, and it is shown that coherent diffraction-free fields with arbitrary profiles can be expressed as the superposition of shifted zero-order Bessel beams and temporary parametric representations of the shifted functions. Diffraction-free fields with partially coherent features can be obtained. Experimental results are shown for each case.