Optical vortex torque measured with optically trapped microbarbells

Optical vortex beams carry orbital angular momentum and thus exert torque on illuminated objects. A dielectric microtool–a microbarbell–is used in two-laser optical tweezers to measure the torque of a focused optical vortex. The tool was either freely rotating due to the applied torque or set into oscillations by the counteracting force. Four different trapping configurations provided different ways of sensing the torque and gave consistent results. The value of torque was determined by confronting the experimental results with numerical and analytical models.