Abstract

In the past few years a great interest has been raising in helical beams that are able to transport spin and orbital angular momentum (OAM) in its propagation direction [1,2], such as Laguerre-Gaussian beams. OAM is related to the transverse profile of the beam, exhibiting also an angular-momentum-like behavior. These characteristic transverse profiles have been exploited in a wide range of applications; spanning from optical tweezers to quantum information protocols [3]. For most of them, a suitable model to describe the light-matter interaction is required. Here, we address the problem of photoionization by means of the interaction of a pulse beam carrying orbital angular momentum with the simplest atom that one can consider; Hydrogen. This academic problem clarifies a fundamental question: the OAM transfer from light to the electron quantum state.

© 2009 IEEE