Optical binding mechanisms

The interaction between multiple particles in an optical trap, and the phenomena collectively referred to as "optical binding", have been the subject of interest in a number of different trapping geometries. This paper discusses the mechanisms which lead to optically bound chains of particles in counter-propagating Bessel and Gaussian beams as well as evanescent wave traps. We show that the apparently similar structures of particles in different trapping regimes are caused by a number of separate underlying physical processes.