Photopolymers as vectorial sensors of the electric field

We propose to use radially, azimuthally and circularly polarized Bessel beams as inhomogeneous illuminating system to unambiguously analyze the vectorial optical response of azo- dye polymers. It is shown that the well- known sensitivity of azo- dye molecules to polarization direction gives rise to surface deformations which are proportional to the longitudinal electric- field component. This property opens a large field of applications in the vectorial analysis of light fields, especially for nano- optics/ nanophotonics. (c) 2006 Optical Society of America.