Abstract
An optical binding force between two nearby colloidal particles trapped by two coherent laser beams is measured by phase-sensitive detection. The binding force is long-range and spatially oscillatory. For identical linearly-polarized incident beams, the oscillation period is equal to the optical wavelength. For mutually perpendicular polarizations, a new force appears with half-wavelength periodicity, caused by double inter-particle scattering. This force is observable only with cross-polarized incident beams, for which the stronger single-scattering forces are forbidden by parity.
| Original language | English |
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| Article number | 38883 |
| Journal | Scientific Reports |
| Volume | 6 |
| DOIs | |
| Publication status | Published - 16 Dec 2016 |