Flexible generation of higher-order Poincaré beams with high efficiency by manipulating the two eigenstates of polarized optical vortices.

Vector beams contain complex polarization structures and they are inherently nonseparable in the polarization and spatial degrees of freedom. The spatially variant polarizations of vector beams have enabled many important applications in a variety of fields ranging from classical to quantum physics. In this study, we designed and realized a setup based on Mach-Zehnder interferometer for achieving the vector beams at arbitrary points of higher-order Poincare sphere, through manipulating two eigenstates in the Mach-Zehnder interferometer system with the combined spiral phase plate. We demonstrated the generation of different kinds of higher-order Poincare beams, including the beams at points on a latitude or longitude of higher-order Poincare sphere, Bell states for vertical bar l vertical bar = 1 and vertical bar l vertical bar = 2, radially polarized beams of very high order with l = 16, etc. Vector beams of high quality and good accuracy are experimentally achieved, and the flexibility, feasibility and high efficiency of the setup are demonstrated by the practical performance. (C) 2020 Optical Society of America under the terms of the OSA Open Access Publishing Agreement