Comment on "Geometric absorption of electromagnetic angular momentum", C. Konz, G. Benford

Abstract

The core theorem on which the above paper is centred - that a perfectly conducting body of revolution absorbs no angular momentum from an axisymmetric electromagnetic wave field - is in fact a special case of a more general result in electromagnetic scattering theory. In addition, the scaling of the efficiency of transfer of angular momentum to an object with the wavelength and object size merits further discussion. Finally, some comments are made on the choice of terminology and the erroneous statement that a circularly polarized plane wave does not carry angular momentum.