Azimuthally polarized lasers and phase shift coatings

Resonators employing conical mirrors can produce azimuthally and radially polarized modes. These modes are determined by an iterative Fox and Li type calculation using a plane wave spectrum propagator, except that the full vector fields are included. It is shown that the polarization mode can be controlled through specially designed multilayer coatings. A coating producing a 90 deg phase shift between the p and s reflections will change the azimuthally polarized mode to a linearly polarized mode.