A Guided Tour of Light Beams : From lasers to optical knots

From science-fiction death rays to supermarket scanners, lasers are deeply embedded in our daily lives and cultures. But in recent decades, the standard laser beam has evolved into an array of more specialized light beams with a variety of strange and counter-intuitive properties. This is an introductory survey of these specialized light beams and their scientific applications. It is a unified treatment of the subject for undergraduates with a basic knowledge of optics and quantum mechanics. It is a collection of many topics currently found only in the original research literature.