Photonic hook: a new curved light beam

Abstract

It is well known that electromagnetic radiation propagates along a straight line, but this common sense was broken by the artificial curved light-the Airy beam. In this Letter, we demonstrate a new type of curved light beam besides the Airy beam, the so-called "photonic hook." This photonic hook is a curved high-intensity focus by a dielectric trapezoid particle illuminated by a plane wave. The difference between the phase velocity and the interference of the waves inside the particle causes the phenomenon of focus bending.