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OPEN Broadband optical vortex beam

generation using flat‑surface
nanostructured gradient index
vortex phase masks
Hue Thi Nguyen 1,2,3*, Rafal Kasztelanic 1,2, Adam Filipkowski 1,2, Dariusz Pysz 2, Hieu Van Le 3,
Ryszard Stepien 2, Takashige Omatsu 4, Wieslaw Krolikowski 5 & Ryszard Buczynski 1,2*
We developed a new kind of compact flat-surface nanostructured gradient index vortex phase mask,
for the effective generation of optical vortex beams in broadband infrared wavelength range. A low-
cost nanotechnological material method was employed for this work. The binary structure component
consists of 17,557 nano-sized rods made of two lead–bismuth–gallium silicate glasses which were
developed in-house. Those small rods are spatially arranged in such a way that, according to effective
medium theory, the refractive index of this internal structure is constant in the radial direction and
linearly changes following azimuthal angle. Numerical results demonstrated that a nanostructured
vortex phase mask with a thickness of 19 μm can convert Gaussian beams into fundamental optical
vortices over 290 nm wavelength bandwidth from 1275 to 1565 nm. This has been confirmed in
experiments using three diode laser sources operating at 1310, 1550, and 1565 nm. The generation
of vortex beams is verified through their uniform doughnut-like intensity distributions, clear
astigmatic transformation patterns, and spiral as well as fork-like interferograms. This new flat-surface
component can be directly mounted to an optical fiber tip for simplifying vortex generator systems as
well as easier manipulation of the generated OVB in three-dimensional space.

Optical beams carrying orbital angular momentum (OAM) which are also known as optical vortex beams
(OVBs), are complexly-spatially structured beams with unique ­properties1. An OVB has a central singularity
indicating a zero-intensity area surrounded by a doughnut-shaped intensity distribution in its cross section.
Each optical vortex beam has an azimuthal phase modulation proportional to a factor of exp(ilθ) which is
transmitted helically along its propagation axis. The topological charge l with integer values shows the order
of the vortex beam and associated with it, the amount of OAM carried by each photon equal to lℏ2. Due to the
presence of those unique properties, OVBs have found numerous applications in various research fi ­ elds3. Among
others, OVBs greatly contributed to super-resolution microscopy with stimulated emission depletion (STED)
­technique4,5; optical tweezers and ­spanners6–9 in which OAM of the beam imparts a trap and rotation on the par-
ticle. OAM-carrying optical vortex beams have been also employed to enhance capacity and security in free-space
information ­transfer10,11 and have recently been used to facilitate advances in ­telecommunications12,13. Another
application of interest is laser ablation and surface structuring using high-power optical vortex beam as a new
materials processing approach to create micro/nano-scaled monocrystalline needles and chiral s­ tructures14,15.
More recently, a new class of coronagraph in astrophysics, so-called stellar coronagraphs, has been developed
with the use of optical vortex, to study stellar disks or find planets next to the bright s­ tars16,17.
In a broad perspective, optical vortex beams have become important in many scientific and manufactur-
ing applications, thereby there is a demand for efficient and reliable methods of generation of such beams. In
general, in order to generate vortex beam with a certain topological charge (certain OAM mode) one must
impose a helical structure onto the phase of the incident beam. This can be realized typically in two ways, i.e.
using optical phase elements or fiber-based vortex g­ enerator18,19. In the first method, the implementation of the

1
University of Warsaw, Faculty of Physics, 02‑093 Warsaw, Poland. 2Department of Optical Fiber Technology and
Quantum Systems, Łukasiewicz Research Network-Institute of Microelectronics & Photonics, 02‑668 Warsaw,
Poland. 3Faculty of Natural Sciences, Hong Duc University, 40‑157, Thanh Hoa, Vietnam. 4Molecular Chirality
Research Center, Chiba University, 1‑33, Chiba, Japan. 5Department of Quantum Science and Technologies,
Australian National University, Canberra, Australia. *email: hue.nguyen@fuw.edu.pl; ryszard.buczynski@
fuw.edu.pl

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azimuthal phase term exp(ilθ) on the fundamental guided mode is carried out using free-space phase elements
such as spiral phase plates (SPPs)20, q-plates21, computer-generated ­holograms22, and spatial light modulators
(SLMs)23,24. Among others, SPPs and SLMs are commonly used because the generated beams are stable but they
both require bulk setup of discrete optical elements for operation. In the second method, the OAM modes can
be generated with the use of specially designed fiber structures like helical fiber Bragg ­gratings25, long-period
fiber ­gratings26 and fiber mode selective c­ ouplers27. Recently, a combination of the standard optical fiber and the
SPP element resulting in a compact and robust fiber-based vortex generator has been developed s­ uccessfully28.
However, in general, current approaches have certain limitations such as complex optical setup configurations
and expensive manufacturing processes, low efficiency, low operating power, large size, low integration ability,
narrow operating bandwidths and operation in a particular medium only, i.e. mostly in air.
In the last couple of years, we reported the development of a nanostructured gradient index vortex phase
mask (nVPM) for the generation and control of optical vortex ­beam29–32. Those nVPMs were used to convert
Gaussian beams into single-charge optical vortices in the visible wavelength regime. The mask was developed
employing a low-cost nanotechnological material method which allows creating any refractive index profile for
micro-optical components. So far, developed optical components include optical vortex ­mask29, GRIN l­ enses33,34,
and ­axicons35. The nVPMs introduce the phase modulation by its internal azimuthal gradient refractive index
profile. That means, the vortex beam was generated inside the components so its properties like doughnut-
shaped intensity and topological charge value will be preserved in different transparent media including gases
and ­liquids30. Moreover, the mask has completely flat-parallel surfaces which can be easily integrated with other
optical elements as well as optical fibers. Indeed, we successfully created a robust fiber-based microprobe with
an integrated nVPM for fundamental-charge OVB ­generation32. The integrated fiber-nVPM-lens system can
effectively generate and, at the same time focus ­vortices36. It should be noted that those nVPMs work well for
visible range. However, they show limitations such as very strong light localization in the intensity distribution
of the beams or even breaking OAM mode for operating in the infrared range. Besides, those nVPMs are design
for specific ­wavelengths32.
In this work, we developed broadband nanostructured gradient index vortex phase masks (BnVPMs) for the
generation of optical vortex beams over a wide wavelength range in the infrared regime. The binary structure of
the mask consists of 17,557 nano-rods in total. They were made of two lead–bismuth–gallium glasses which are
designed and synthesized in-house. To minimize vortex distortion due to waveguiding effect, as we observed in
previously fabricated vortex m­ asks29,30, we fabricated 19 µm thick mask. Both numerical simulation and experi-
ments verify the feasibility of the conversion of fundamental modes into OAM modes using compact BnVPMs.

Results and discussion

Numerical analysis
In order to study the optical beams shaping by the BnVPM, the beam propagation along z-axis through the
19-µm-long component and then in the air was numerically modeled. The dependence of the total phase shift cre-
ated by the 19-µm-long BnVPMs on the operating wavelength can be determined using the following ­equation29:
�n()d0
�ϕ = 2πl() = 2π , (1)

where: Δn(λ) denotes a difference of refractive indices of glasses with minimum and maximum refractive indices
forming the gradient index mask for the considered wavelength λ, ­d0—a thickness of the mask, l(λ)—a topo-
logical charge of BnVPMs for the considered wavelength. As an ideal wavelength independent of vortex mask
is impossible to attain, in this work we adopt a pragmatic approach and accept total phase shift is within 10%
of the designated �ϕ = 2π value in the near infrared wavelength range to develop spectrally broadband vortex
with a constant topological charge l = 1. This phase shift corresponds to 10% changes of fractional vortex charge
around the nominal integer value (l = 1.0 ± 0.1). The criterion of 10% is somehow arbitrary but reflects our results
obtained in the previous study on borosilicate-glass n ­ VPM32 where we experimentally realized OVBs with the
same quality and characteristics even though the topological charge was within 10% of its nominal value.
For all simulation tasks, we used in-house developed software employing the Fourier transform beam propa-
gation method (BPM)37. It is assumed that all the computational simulations in this work are conducted with the
use of a planar beam and with Gaussian intensity distribution as the input source. The incident beam is limited
by a circular aperture with the diameter of 25 µm. A few input wavelengths were considered, namely (λ = 1275;
1310; 1400; 1550; 1565 nm). The computational window has the size of (x,y,z) = 200 × 200 × 500 µm. The lateral
resolution is fixed at 0.1 µm. The longitudinal resolution varied between 0.05 and 0.5 µm, for the propagation
inside the mask and in air, respectively. The wavelength dependence of calculated output intensity and phase
distribution at a distance of 500 µm from the output end of the mask is shown in Fig. 1.
The results confirm that masks generates a high-quality optical vortex beam with topological charge l = 1 at
1400 nm wavelength depicted in Fig. 1c. The beam has a relatively uniform doughnut-like intensity distribution
due to the reduced influence of the waveguide effect when the light beam propagates in 19 µm thin medium. It
also shows a correct single-twist helical structure with the phase singularity located exactly at its center.
In addition, it can be seen that the fundamental-charged OVBs with the fractional topological charge vary-
ing within the range of 10% (l = 0.9–1.1) are obtained at all other considered wavelengths from 1275 to 1565 nm
(Fig. 1a,b,d,e). All these results show the corrected phase structure with single arms and doughnut-like intensity
profiles. These numerical results confirm that the designed BnVPM works well for the whole wavelength range
of 290 nm from 1275 to 1565 nm. Notice that the quality of the vortex beam generated with a given mask is
significantly better for shorter wavelengths. This is very likely caused by the excess of the winding phase which

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Figure 1.  Numerical simulations of the optical performance of the designed BnVPM in the generation of
OVBs for the wavelength range from 1275 to 1565 nm: the cross-sectional intensity profile (top row) and phase
structures (bottom row). The numerical results are visualized at a distance of 500 µm from the output end of the
mask. The l denotes the topological charge of the generated vortex beam.

exceeds 2π for shorter wavelengths. For longer wavelengths, the phase singularity is, in fact, incomplete so the
beam experiences stronger deformation in propagation with visible waveguiding effect.

Experiment
This section is devoted to an experimental verification of the optical performance of the fabricated BnVPM to
generate of OVBs at several wavelengths mentioned above (λ = 1310; 1550; and 1565 nm). We note that opti-
mum performance with vortex topological charge l = 1 is expected for the wavelength of 1.4 µm. However, due
to a lack of an appropriate laser source we carried on experimental work for a few wavelengths at both sides of
the optimum wavelength. For that purpose, we used three pigtailed single mode diode laser sources (Butterfly-
laser-diodes, Thorlabs). In the measurement setup, our fabricated BnVPM sample with a thickness of 19 µm
was mounted to the in-house 3D-printed holder. The whole system was attached to a 3-axis stage (Nanomax,
Thorlabs) for precise control of the sample position in space. All measurements were carried out using the same
optical setup, with only laser sources being changed between measurements. The incident beam from the light
source was collimated by a microscope objective (MO, magnification ×20 and NA = 0.35) before illuminating
the BnVPM sample. It should be noted that the illuminating beam size should correspond to the aperture of the
BnVPM to ensure the effective generation of vortex beams. The output beam that emerged from the sample was
collimated by another MO (magnification ×20 and NA = 0.35). Then we used three techniques (Fig. 2) to verify

Figure 2.  Schematic of measurement setups for studies on the ability of the fabricated BnVPM on the
generation of optical vortex beams in a broadband infrared wavelength range. Setups for observing doughnut-
like intensity distribution (a); for observing the phase singularity and determining the topological charge of the
generated OVBs using astigmatic transformation (b); and Mach–Zehnder interferometer configuration (c).

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the characteristics of the generated OVBs namely, doughnut-like intensity distribution, phase singularity and
topological charge.
The first setup (Fig. 2a) is used to record the cross-sectional intensity pattern of the beam. Herein, the col-
limated output beam generated by the BnVPM was projected on a screen and recorded by IR camera. The dis-
tance between the output end of the BnVPM and the imaging system (screen and camera) was fixed at 50 cm.
The second setup (Fig. 2b) was used to study the effect of the astigmatic transformation on the generated vortex
­beam38. It allows for a quick determination of the topological charge of the beam. The main part of the first
experimental setup was kept unchanged for the generation of OVBs, but a cylindrical lens was placed in front
of the screen at a distance exactly equal to its focal length of f = 7.5 cm to observe the characteristic pattern of
bright and dark stripes on the screen.
Another common analysis of phase singularity and topological charge of an OVB involves observation of
interference patterns resulted from the interference between OVB and a reference Gaussian beam. This was real-
ized in Mach–Zehnder interferometer c­ onfiguration39 as shown in Fig. 2c. A fork-like or spiral interference pat-
terns were formed when the generated vortex beam and the Gaussian reference beam interfered non-collinearly
and collinearly, respectively. The appearance of additional fringes coming out from the central zero-intensity
region in the fork-like structure confirms the phase singularity as well as indicates the topological charge value
of the generated OV beam. This would be also indicated by the number of spiral arms emerging from the center
of the co-axial interferogram.
The experimental results at the wavelength λ = 1310 nm are shown in Fig. 3. Figure 3a depicts the experi-
mentally observed annular character in the output beam’s intensity distribution. Its clearly dark central region
indicates the existence of phase singularity of the beam. This can be also seen in the graphs in Fig. 3a describing
horizontal and vertical intensity profiles of the vortex cross-sectional pattern. The intensity distribution on the
ring-shape is relatively uniform, showing a weak influence of the waveguiding effect when the light propagates
inside such a thin nanostructured component (thickness of 19 µm). Figure 3b presents the results of the astig-
matic transformation of the generated beam using the setup in Fig. 2b. We clearly see that in the astigmatic
intensity pattern consists of one elongated dark region clearly separating two bright stripes, indicating the single
topological charge l = 1 of the output beam.
Those results were further confirmed by analysis of the interference patterns observed in the setup as shown
in Fig. 2c. We obtained the fork-like (Fig. 3c) and spiral (Fig. 3d) pattern corresponding to non-collinearly and
collinearly interference between the vortex beam and Gaussian beam, respectively. In the fork-like structure, there
is one extra fringe coming out from the central zero intensity region substantiating the axial phase singularity
as well as a single topological charge of the OVB. Moreover, this is further confirmed by the spiral pattern—a
single spiral arm surrounding a singularity point at its center. All these results demonstrate that our BnVPM
can experimentally convert a Gaussian beam into an optical vortex beam with topological charge l = 1 at the
wavelength of λ = 1310 nm.
In the next set of experiments we used BnVPM at the two longer wavelengths λ = 1550 nm and 1565 nm. The
results are shown in Fig. 4.
It can be seen that BnVPM performed similarly to the case λ = 1310 nm case, demonstrating its ability to effi-
ciently generate optical vortex beams with topological charge l = 1, as there are doughnut-like intensity patterns

Figure 3.  Experimental results for verifying the single-charge OVB generation at λ = 1310 nm: doughnut-
like intensity distribution and its horizontal and vertical profile (a); astigmatic transformation pattern of the
generated vortex (b); fork-like (c) and spiral (d) interferograms realized in Mach–Zehnder interferometric
configuration.

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Figure 4.  Experimental results for verifying the single-charge OVB generation at λ = 1550 nm and 1565 nm:
doughnut-like intensity distribution (a,e); astigmatic transformation pattern of the generated vortex (b,f); fork-
like (c,g) and spiral (d,h) interferograms realized in Mach–Zehnder interferometric configuration.

with the visible zero-intensity central regions. The single charge value l = 1 of the vortices is ascertained by the
presence of a single dark elongated strip in the astigmatic transformation pattern and the presence of only one
extra fringe, and single spiral arm in the corresponding interferograms. Those experimental results are agree
with our numerical simulations. Notice that the quality of the vortex beams generated in these experiments
deteriorates as the wavelength departs from the optimal value of 1310 nm. As elaborated earlier, this effect is a
result of the incompleteness of the winding phase, so the beam experiences diffraction and waveguiding, result-
ing in stronger nonuniformity.

Discussion
We have developed new nanostructured gradient index vortex phase masks for the generation of optical vortex
beams in a broadband infrared wavelength range. The vortex component was designed and fabricated using the
nano structurization technique as described i­n29. It is composed of nano-rods made of two kinds of in-house
developed lead–bismuth–gallium glasses which are characterized by wide transmission window up to 4.5 μm.
This pair of glasses have a high refractive index difference (∆n = 0.073 ÷ 0.708 for near infrared wavelength range
up to 1.7 μm), that requires thin BnVPMs (d ≤ 23 μm) to create the full 2π phase modulation.
As a demonstration, the BnVPM was designed and fabricated with 17,557 nano-rods in the entire structure.
It had a diameter of 29 μm and a thickness of 19 μm. We experimentally demonstrated that the mask allowed the
conversion of Gaussian beams into a high-quality vortex beam with topological charge l = 1 at three wavelengths
λ = 1310; 1550; and 1565 nm. In addition, the numerical simulations showed that the investigated BnVPM should
work well for a total bandwidth of ~ 290 nm from 1275 to 1565 nm.
The fabricated BnVPMs have completely parallel surfaces which allow simple integration with other com-
ponents and optical fiber to form a compact fiber-vortex component optical system offering new functionali-
ties. Similarly to the previously considered by us vortex phase masks, our new vortex converter introduces the
angular phase shift via the internal refractive index profile. Therefore, their performance does not depend on
the surrounding transparent media. This means that developed flat-surface nanostructured vortex phase masks
that work in a broadband infrared range and are fiber-based, are beneficial for various applications in infrared
regime, such as particle manipulation and material processing.
Importantly, those results confirmed the flexibility of our proposed fabrication method which allows design-
ing VPMs to work for different wavelength ranges depending on the available glasses. This is promising for the
generation of optical vortex beams with unique properties like achromatic vortices, and white vortices. It is
should also note that the used fabrication method is cost effective and can be used in mass-manufacturing of
optical elements. From one initial preform, we obtain tens of meters of sub preform with different diameters after
the first thermal process. Those can be used furher to fabricate thousands of BnVPMs or BnVPM array elements.
Moreover, from one structured fiber, we can fabricate BnVPMs with different thickness for generation of OVBs
with different topological charges at different wavelengths.

Materials and methods

Glasses selection and design of nanostructured gradient index vortex phase masks
In principle, a gradient index vortex phase mask modulates the phase of the incident beam by continuous azi-
muthal variation of its refractive index profile. In particular, the refractive index of the cross section of the mask
is constant in the radial direction and changes linearly with azimuthal angle θ: n(θ) = n0 + θ(n1 − ­n0)/2π, where n
­ 1,

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­n0 is the highest and the lowest refractive index value of the material of the mask. Due to the current technological
limitations, the realization of azimuthal refractive index profile in a continuous solid medium is a big challenge,
especially at microscale. In 2017, we employed the binary nanostructuring technique to successfully create, the
vortex phase micro-optical components (nVPM)29. By using this method, we designed nanostructured masks that
consist of thousands of parallel nano-sized rods. Each of those rods is made of one of two types of glasses, with
different refractive indices corresponding to the highest and the lowest values n ­ 1(λ) and n
­ 0(λ), respectively. The
effective refractive index profile introduced by the binary-nanostructure component is defined by the arrange-
ment of those nano-sized rods constituting the structure of the nVPM. This approach is based on effective
medium theory (EMT) which is described by the Maxwell–Garnett effective medium approximation m ­ odel40.
However, the previously fabricated nVPMs worked well only for wavelengths shorter than 1 μm30,31. The
reason for that is that the nVPM with a constant thickness d ­ 0 can create an angular phase modulation at a certain
input wavelength λ equal to Δφ = 2πΔnd0/λ with Δn = n1 − n0. To generate an optical vortex beam with topological
charge l, the required phase modulation of the beam depends on two factors, vortex mask length and refractive
index difference between low and high refractive index areas can be calculated with Eq. (1).
To generate optical vortex beams at longer wavelengths, the nVPMs should be thicker than the ones used
for the shorter wavelengths. However, the thicker mask suffers from, the so-called, waveguiding effect in which
the light tends to localize in the area of high refractive index. Consequently, this leads to nonuniform intensity
distribution in the beam cross-section or even to the broken doughnut-shape of the OV b ­ eam31. Therefore, for
designing an optical vortex mask working in infrared wavelengths which should be thin enough to reduce the
light localization, the most important parameter needed to be controlled is the refractive index difference of
glasses used. This means that by using the same process and only changing glasses to ones with different disper-
sive properties we can design different nanostructured vortex phase masks. By choosing either commercially
available pairs of glasses or synthesizing our own we can create nVPMs with different working wavelength ranges.
In this work, we aimed to design a broadband nanostructured vortex mask (BnVPM) working in near infrared
regime. To achieve this, the first condition is that the pair of glasses should have the broadband transmission in
near infrared range. Secondly, their thermal and mechanical coefficients need to be matched for multiple thermal
processes. Thirdly, the refractive index difference must large enough for nVPM to be sufficiently thin, but be still
greater than 15 μm which stems from the fabrication constraints. Finally, and most importantly, the broadband
property means the BnVPM should have low sensitivity to wavelength in a given range. Formally, this means
that the variation of phase for the wavelength:
 
�ϕ 1 1 ∂�n
= 2πld0 = 2π − (2)
∂   ∂
should be as close to zero as possible. In principle, this requires finding materials whose dispersion would behave
as 1/λ. Since this is rather impossible, one can minimize Eq. (2) by making the vortex mask as thin as possible.
Considering that d0 = lλ/Δn, the last requirement means that we should aim at materials with very high refrac-
tive index contrast.
Based on those conditions, we developed a pair of lead–bismuth-gallium glasses labeled CS740 and C ­ S103041.
The glasses were in-house synthesized by the melt-quenching approach at Łukasiewicz Research Network-Insti-
tute of Microelectronics & Photonics (IMiF). The glasses are composed of commercially available components
­SiO2, ­B2O3, ­Ga2O3, PbO, and CdO whose molar mass percentages are given in Table 1.
The developed glasses are 5-compound lead–bismuth–gallium systems that are characterized by broad trans-
mittance windows in the infrared wavelength range, making those glasses having a good transparency from
visible up to 4.5 μm as shown in Fig. 5a. It can be also seen that the transmittance range is shifted to a shorter
wavelength direction for the glass with a higher content of ­SiO2.
Importantly, the presence of the two additional oxides of ­SiO2 and CdO can reduce the tendency of the
lead–bismuth–gallium systems to ­crystallize41,42. As a result, the crystallization resistance and thermal stability
of both optimized glasses are significantly enhanced, which makes them highly compatible materials with mul-
tistage thermal processing. Notably, those glasses provide good rheological properties and relevant expansion
coefficients as well as thermal matched c­ oefficients37. The viscosity-temperature characteristics measured by the
dilatometric setup and in the heat Leitz microscope showed very similar values for CS1030 and CS740. The differ-
ence in curvature temperatures and in sphere temperatures between those glasses are relatively low, ΔTc = 50 °C
and ΔTsph = 60 °C, respectively. Simultaneously, the coefficients of thermal expansion are similar for both glasses
and is αCS1030 = 83.8 × ­10−7 ­K−1 and equal to αCS740 = 81.3 × ­10−7 ­K−1 in the range from 20 to 300 °C. The difference
αCS1030 = 83.8 × ­10−7 ­K−1 and equal to αCS740 = 81.3 × ­10−7 ­K−1 reported ­in37. Those allow the two soft glasses to be
thermally processed together and ensure limited stress during cooling. Reduction of cooling induced stresses is
especially important as it may lead to fabricated structure cracking and warping.

Glass label SiO2 Bi2O3 Ga2O3 PbO CdO

CS740 40% 10% 13% 30% 7%
CS1030 30% 14% 16% 30% 10%

Table 1.  Chemical composition of the lead–bismuth-gallium glasses.

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Figure 5.  (a) Transmission properties of CS1030 and CS740 glasses measured in samples of 2 mm thickness;
(b) wavelength dependence of refractive indices of the CS glasses and their refractive index (RI) difference.

The dispersion properties of the developed CS glasses were measured using a Michaelson interferometer. The
measurement range was in 0.5–1.7 μm range. Based on those experimental results, the Sellmeier coefficients ­(Bi
and ­Ci) were determined as in Table 2 following Sellmeier’s formula:
3
 Bi 2
n2 () = 1 + 2 (3)
 − Ci
i=1

These optimized glasses CS740 and CS1030 are characterized by very high refractive indices i.e. nCS1030 = 1.9665
and nCS740 = 1.8925 measured at wavelength λ = 1310 nm. The increase in the concentration of the low molecular
weight component ­SiO2 in glass composition results in a decrease of the refractive index for CS740 glass. CS1030
has a higher refractive index for the whole considered wavelength range.
Figure 5b presents the wavelength dependence of the refractive index of the CS glasses calculated using the
Sellmeier coefficients obtained in Table 2. Their refractive index difference is relatively high Δn = 0.073 ÷ 0.078 for
near-infrared considered wavelength range) as shown in the sub-figure. These are about three times higher than
those for the NC-glass nVPM (ΔnNC ≈ 0.025) at the same wavelength reported i­ n30. As a result, the thickness of
CS-glass BnVPM required for a 2π phase shift modulation in order to generate OVBs with topological charge
l = 1 is about three times smaller than for NC-glass nVPM at the same considered ­wavelength30.
In the nanostructuring approach, the binary structure of the BnVPM was designed and optimized based on
effective medium t­ heory40 and simulated annealing approximation with an in-house developed a­ lgorithm43.
In this approach, using the refractive index profile of the developed CS glasses, we first determined the target
continuous refractive index 2D map of the cross-section of the vortex component as mentioned above. Then,
we designed its corresponding binary structure composed of spatially distributed rods made of CS1030 and
CS740 glasses. In particular, the effective permittivity (consequently effective refractive index) for all nano-rods
of the binary dielectric-material structure is assumed to be a weighted average of the effective permittivity of the
particular rod and of its neighborhood nano-rods according to the effective medium theory. The distribution of
those nano-rods is optimized using simulated annealing a­ pproximation43 in such a way that the final structure
will provide an effective refractive index profile as close as possible to the desired continuous gradient refractive
index target. The details of the design and optimization process of the binary nanostructure pattern of a BnVPM
were discussed in our previous ­works29,30. It should be noted that the condition for a binary medium to be able to
be considered as an effective continuous material is the size of the individual rods in the structure. The diameter
of those rods must be smaller than the operating wavelength. Otherwise, the diffraction effects of individual
elements become considerable and degrade the component’s p ­ erformance44. The reported threshold value was
λ/2π40, but recently, this value was reduced to λ/3 by controlling the diffusion during the drawing p ­ rocess45.

Sellmeier coefficients CS1030 CS740

B1 2.15976 2.42275
B2 0.22578 0.135667
B3 1.97162 1.50
C1 [μm2] 0.02412 0.02261
C2 [μm2] 0.09301 0.09297
C3 [μm2] 195.0 153.49733

Table 2.  Sellmeier coefficients for the lead–bismuth-gallium glasses.

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To model the broadband performance of the vortex mask we used Eq. (1). The optimum thickness d of
BnVPM with topological charge 1 can be derived from Eq. (1) in the form d = n() 1
, where λ denotes the wave-
length in the center of the considered infrared range. For the selected wavelength of 1400 nm the optimum thick-
ness of BnVPM is 19 µm for the considered pair of glasses and corresponds to 2π phase shift in the mask. With
Eq. (1) we can further calculate the dependence of the phase shift in the mask for other wavelengths (Fig. 6a).
The obtained phase shift characteristics is very flat due to the specific relation between material dispersion as
shown in Fig. 5b. Similarly the topological charge of generated OVB can be calculated for the range of wave-
lengths with Eq. (1). A slope of this characteristic is also very low and proves small changes of the topological
charge with wavelengths (Fig. 6b).
Our binary nanostructure BnVPM was fabricated using the stack and draw technique. This method is com-
monly applied for the development of photonic crystal fibers but can be easily modified for the fabrication of
­BnVPMs29,30. The schematic of the fabrication procedure is represented in Fig. 7. The procedure begins with
manually stacking a preform (following the designed pattern) using two kinds of CS-glass rods with a diameter
of 0.3 mm and a length of 11 cm (Fig. 7a). This initial preform has a diameter of 4.53 cm. Then, in the first ther-
mal step, the preform is drawn down to a diameter of around 2–5 mm in the fiber drawing tower, as shown in
Fig. 7b. The temperature of the glasses during the thermal process has to be kept in range between curvature and
sphere creation to maintain proper viscosity for ­drawing37,44. In the next step, this structure is placed inside a
glass capillary made from lower-RI glass CS740 (Fig. 7c), making an intermediate preform. In the second thermal
step (Fig. 7d), we do multiple drawings of the intermediate preform. The multi-drawing process finished when
the diameter of the drawn structure reached the standard size of the optical fiber (125 μm). In the last step of the
fabrication procedure (Fig. 7e), the final drawn structured fiber is cut and polished until the designed thickness
is obtained. This nanostructuring technique offers high control and reproducibility and is ready for mass fabri-
cation. From one stacked preform, we can obtain thousands of identical-structured elements with thicknesses
of tens of micrometers. In addition, it is possible to obtain vortex elements with different diameters in a single
process by adjusting drawing parameters like temperature, feeding, and drawing speed.
Our binary structure component as shown in Fig. 8a–f is composed of 17,557 rods in total, including 8907
CS1030-glass rods and 8650 CS740-glass rods. Its vortex structure diameter is 29 μm, with 153 nano-rods on the
structure diagonal. That means the individual rod has a size of around 200 nm which is well below the threshold
value for the infrared regimes for application of effective medium theory. This is confirmed by a scanning electron

Figure 6.  The phase shift in the nanostructured vortex phase mask composed of two CS1030 and CS740 glasses
with a thickness of 19 µm (a) and the topological charge of generated vortex beam (b) for various wavelengths.

Figure 7.  Schematic of fabrication procedure of the BnVPM components using CS740 and CS1030 glass rods.

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Figure 8.  The design of binary-nanostructured vortex component (a) and its corresponding stacked preform
(b); SEM images of the fabricated BnVPM sample (c) and its view under the microscope (f); the magnification
of vortex structure (d) and its magnified part showing the size of individual nano-rods (e).

microscopy (SEM) image presented in Fig. 8d,e. Our fabricated BnVPM with the thickness of d = 19 µm (Fig. 8f)
was designed to work with the most popular near infrared sources.

Data availability
The datasets generated during and/or analyzed during the current study are available from the corresponding
author upon reasonable request.

Received: 16 September 2023; Accepted: 6 November 2023

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Acknowledgements
This work was supported by Narodowe Centrum Nauki (PRELUDIUM-20 UMO-2021/41/N/ST7/01517),
HORIZON EIC Pathfinder (ReaCtor 101099405), Kakenhi Grants-in-Aid (Nos. P22H05131, JP22H05138,
JP23H00270) from the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science (JSPS) and the Core Research for Evolu-
tional Science and Technology program (No. JPMJCR1903) of the Japan Science and Technology Agency (JST).

Author contributions
Concept of nVPM in this work are given by R.B. and W.K. R.K, A.F., H.T.N. and R.B. designed the nVPM. D.P.,
R.S., H.T.N., H.L.V. and A.F. fabricated the nVPM. T.O., R.K. and H.T.N. measured the properties of the nVPM
and performed numerical analysis. R.B., T.O. and W.K. supervised the work. The manuscript was written by
N.T.N., R.B. and W.K.

Competing interests
The authors declare no competing interests.

Additional information
Correspondence and requests for materials should be addressed to H.T.N. or R.B.
Reprints and permissions information is available at www.nature.com/reprints.
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