Unveiling the photonic spin Hall effect of freely propagating fan-shaped cylindrical vector vortex beams.

An intriguing photonic spin Hall effect (SHE) for a freely propagating fan-shaped cylindrical vector (CV) vortex beam in a paraxial situation is theoretically and experimentally studied. A developed model to describe this kind of photonic SHE is proposed based on angular spectrum diffraction theory. With this model, the close dependences of spin-dependent splitting on the azimuthal order of polarization, the topological charge of the spiral phase, and the propagation distance are accurately revealed. Furthermore, it is demonstrated that the asymmetric spin-dependent splitting of a fan-shaped CV beam can be consciously managed, even with a constant azimuthal order of polarization. Such a controllable photonic SHE is experimentally verified by measuring the Stokes parameters.