Calculating the torque of the optical vortex tweezer to the ellipsoidal micro-particles

Abstract In this paper, we have accurately computed the torque of the optical vortex tweezers to the ellipsoidal micro-particles with the method of finite-difference time-domain (FDTD). The transferred orbital angular momentum (OAM) from the vortex beam to the micro-particles can be obtained based on the scattering phase function (SPF) of the micro-particles. We have verified that the calculated SPF of a spherical particle by FDTD agrees well with that by Mie theory, which indicates that the SPF of micro-particles with any shapes can be calculated by FDTD accurately. In addition, with the method of FDTD, we have obtained the SPFs of the different-shape ellipsoidal micro-particles with same volume, including prolate ellipsoids and oblate ellipsoids. Meanwhile, the transferred OAM between the light and the ellipsoidal micro-particles have been deduced analytically by the relative formulas. And the rotating angular velocities of the trapped ellipsoidal micro-particles have been investigated and discussed in detail based on the obtained corresponding SPFs.