Propagation Characteristics of Circular Airy Vortex Beams in a Uniaxial Crystal along the Optical Axis.

Circular airy vortex beams (CAVBs) have attracted much attention due to their "abruptly autofocusing" effect, phase singularity, and their potential applications in optical micromanipulation, communication, etc. In this paper, we numerically investigated the propagation properties of circular airy beams (CABs) imposed with different optical vortices (OVs) along the optical axis of a uniaxial crystal for the first time. Like other common beams, a left-hand circular polarized (LHCP) CAVB, propagating along the optical axis in a uniaxial crystal, can excite a right-hand circular polarized (RHCP) component superimposed with an on-axis vortex of topological charge (TC) number of 2. When the incident beam is an LHCP CAB imposed with an on-axis vortex of TC number of l = 1, both of the two components have an axisymmetric intensity distribution during propagation and form hollow beams near the focal plane because of the phase singularity. The phase pattern shows that the LHCP component carries an on-axis vortex of TC number of l = 1, while the RHCP component carries an on-axis vortex of TC number of l = 3. With a larger TC number (l = 3), the RHCP component has a larger hollow region in the focal plane compared to the LHCP component. We also studied cases of CABs imposed with one and two off-axis OVs. The off-axis OV makes the CAVB's profile remain asymmetric throughout the propagation. As the propagation distance increases, the off-axis OVs move near the center of the beam and overlap, resulting in a special intensity and phase distribution near the focal plane.

Fabrication of patterned solid surfaces with highly controllable wettability.

Precisely controlling the wettability of a solid surface is vital for a wide range of applications such as control of liquid droplet motion, water collection and the directional transport of fluids. However, fabricating a large-area solid surface with highly controllable wettability in a low-cost way is still challenging. Here we present a cost-effective method to fabricate patterned solid surfaces with highly controllable wettability by combining chemical etching technique, chemical vapor deposition technique and laser direct writing technique. We experimentally demonstrated that the contact angle of water droplets on the patterned surfaces of a porous nanofilm fabricated using the presented fabrication method can be adjusted from 94.4° to 168.2° by changing the duty ratio of the periodic pattern on the patterned surfaces. Furthermore, we experimentally demonstrated that the contact angle of water droplets on the patterned surfaces is almost independent of the shape of the unit cell of the patterns. In addition, we propose an effective surface model to accurately calculate the contact angle of water droplets on patterned solid surfaces. Using the effective surface model, the wettability of a patterned solid surface can be precisely controlled by designing the duty ratio of its periodic patterns.