Electromagnetic forces for an arbitrary optical trapping of a spherical dielectric

A double tweezers setup was employed to perform ultra sensitive force measurements and to obtain the full optical force curve as a function of radial position and wavelength. The light polarization was used to select either the transverse electric (TE), or transverse magnetic (TM), or both, modes excitation. Analytical solution for optical trapping force on a spherical dielectric particle for an arbitrary positioned focused beam is presented in a generalized Lorenz-Mie diffraction theory. The theoretical prediction of the theory agrees well with the experimental results. The algorithm presented here can be easily extended to other beam geometries and scattering particles. (c) 2006 Optical Society of America.