Research

Paper

TESTING February 23, 2026

Particle-like topologies of light in turbulent complex media

Authors

Danilo Gomes Pires, Vasilios Cocotos, Cade Peters, Natalia M. Litchinitser, Andrew Forbes

Abstract

The basic building blocks of many forms of optical topologies are particle-like singularities in phase and polarisation, giving rise to lines of darkness that weave complex threads in 3D space. Although known for half a century since seminal work on dislocations in wave trains, their behaviour in complex media remains under debate, especially with respect to their relative stability. Here we show that polarisation and phase vortices behave identically in one-sided turbulent complex channels. We perform complementary numerical and experimental studies using atmospheric turbulence as a test case, demonstrating agreement and equivalent dynamics. Our work addresses open questions on optical topologies and will be relevant to their harnessing for applications such as sensing, communication, imaging, and information transfer in noisy or complex environments.

Metadata

arXiv ID: 2602.19949
Provider: ARXIV
Primary Category: physics.optics
Published: 2026-02-23
Fetched: 2026-02-24 04:38

Related papers

Raw Data (Debug)
{
  "raw_xml": "<entry>\n    <id>http://arxiv.org/abs/2602.19949v1</id>\n    <title>Particle-like topologies of light in turbulent complex media</title>\n    <updated>2026-02-23T15:17:24Z</updated>\n    <link href='https://arxiv.org/abs/2602.19949v1' rel='alternate' type='text/html'/>\n    <link href='https://arxiv.org/pdf/2602.19949v1' rel='related' title='pdf' type='application/pdf'/>\n    <summary>The basic building blocks of many forms of optical topologies are particle-like singularities in phase and polarisation, giving rise to lines of darkness that weave complex threads in 3D space. Although known for half a century since seminal work on dislocations in wave trains, their behaviour in complex media remains under debate, especially with respect to their relative stability. Here we show that polarisation and phase vortices behave identically in one-sided turbulent complex channels. We perform complementary numerical and experimental studies using atmospheric turbulence as a test case, demonstrating agreement and equivalent dynamics. Our work addresses open questions on optical topologies and will be relevant to their harnessing for applications such as sensing, communication, imaging, and information transfer in noisy or complex environments.</summary>\n    <category scheme='http://arxiv.org/schemas/atom' term='physics.optics'/>\n    <category scheme='http://arxiv.org/schemas/atom' term='physics.app-ph'/>\n    <published>2026-02-23T15:17:24Z</published>\n    <arxiv:comment>5 Pages, 3 Figures</arxiv:comment>\n    <arxiv:primary_category term='physics.optics'/>\n    <author>\n      <name>Danilo Gomes Pires</name>\n    </author>\n    <author>\n      <name>Vasilios Cocotos</name>\n    </author>\n    <author>\n      <name>Cade Peters</name>\n    </author>\n    <author>\n      <name>Natalia M. Litchinitser</name>\n    </author>\n    <author>\n      <name>Andrew Forbes</name>\n    </author>\n  </entry>"
}