Stereo Jones Matrix Holography with Longitudinal Polarization Transformation

Abstract Metasurfaces have exhibited powerful abilities for manipulating multiple fundamental properties of light including amplitude, phase, polarization, and so on. However, these strategies are commonly concentrated on the modulations at a single transverse plane of output light. The spatial evolutions of these properties, especially the polarizations along longitudinal direction, are rarely investigated. Here, a stereo Jones matrix holography method is presented for understanding the spatial evolution including polarization, amplitude, and phase variations along the longitudinal direction. Stereo holographic algorithms in matrix framework are developed to generate multiplane and even continuously varied vectorial holographic images that exhibit distinct polarization states at each transverse plane. This method provides a benchmark of longitudinal polarization transformations as well as beam modulations by simply using a single planar metasurface without extra burdens on optical path. In addition, the obtained propagation‐dependent features can favor the realizing of on‐demand transverse and longitudinal spatial evolution from the perspective of the holographic method. Furthermore, it may also promote the development of related areas including polarization‐switchable devices, optical trapping, microscopy, laser processing, etc.