Nature of the Angular Momentum of Light: Rotational Energy and Geometric Phase

Abstract

The nature of intrinsic/extrinsic character of angular momentum is defined in terms of the kind of the associated rotational energy of the light. The salient features of the spin energy of light and photon are highlighted. Spin angular momentum is intrinsic while orbital angular momentum possesses quasi-intrinsicness only if the vortex-like singularities are present. The claimed spin to orbital angular momentum conversion is interpreted in terms of spin redirection geometric phase. It is pointed out that this interpretation validates our angular momentum holonomy conjecture.