Lateral optical force on a homogenous dielectric microsphere via two-dimensional focused beam

Abstract

Lateral optical force, also known as transverse optical force, acts in the perpendicular direction to the light propagation. Here, we numerically demonstrate a lateral optical force on an isotropic dielectric microsphere by simply using a two-dimensional (2D) focused beam. The 2D focused beam is generated from a plano-convex cylindrical lens incident by a linearly polarized plane wave. The force is found to rely on the polarization direction of the incident wave and Mie scattering of the microsphere. Nontrivial lateral optical force is excited when the polarization direction is not along or perpendicular to the lens axis and can be reversed by simply rotating the orientation of the incident polarization. Furthermore, the lateral optical force magnitude can reach above 20% of that of the total optical force magnitude, which allows a more flexible optical manipulation on microspheres.