Light-polarization Effects on Photo-induced Vortex States in Massive Dirac Materials

In addition to the spin angular momentum imparted by light polarization, vortex light beams (VLBs) carry orbital angular momentum due to the spatial modulation of their wavefronts. When a massive Dirac material is exposed to a circularly polarized (CP) VLB, photon-dressed electronic vortex states arise [1]. In this situation, there exists a total angular momentum operator that commutes with the Floquet Hamiltonian, with eigenvalues that distinguish the emergent vortex states. We employ the Floquet Hamiltonian formalism to investigate how deviations from CP polarization that do not conserve the total angular momentum affect the photo-induced vortex states. We present a comprehensive analysis of how non-circular polarization introduces hybridization and modifies the properties of photon-dressed vortex states, including changes in their quasienergies and spatial distribution.

[1] L. Massaro, C. Meese, N. Sandler, and M. Asmar, arXiv:2404.09086v2 (2024).