Nowadays, tailoring of an optical beam (e.g. controlling its phase, amplitude, and polarization) has moved into the spotlight because of its many applications in various areas of science and technology. Beam shaping is used in particle trapping, THz imaging, optical antennas, material processing, optofluidic microscopy, x-ray microscopy, ophthalmology, array generators, infrared sensors, atom optics, quantum communications, optical manipulation and many other areas. Multi-focusing, array of optical spots, annular beams, top hat beams, optical vortices, petal-like beams, bifocal and multifocal lenses, bottle and extended-focus beams lenses, etc. are some of the key aspects of beam shaping. Beam shaping can be realized in various ways, for example, with the help of refractive and diffractive optics, metamaterials, nano-slits or photonic spin-orbit interactions.

The main goal of this Research Topic is to bring together novel and effective techniques for generating and tailoring different types of optical beams, any types of optical vortices and also novel methods for characterizing the beam's shape, phase, and polarization state.

Within the scope of this Research Topic, authors are encouraged to submit the findings of their recent projects on beam shaping. Studies on shaping and structuring the amplitude, phase and polarization of the optical beams are invited. In particular, we warmly welcome articles covering the following themes:
- Novel, reliable, and flexible methods and techniques of shaping laser beams.
- Novel approaches for generating integer, fractional and perfect vortex beams.
- Topological charge-carrying beams as source of optical angular momentum (OAM).
- Innovative approaches addressing measuring and detecting OAM of optical vortices.
- Newly established studies of vortex-vortex or vortex-matter interactions.
- Physics of optical vortex fields.

This Research Topic welcomes unpublished articles in the form of Original Research papers and Review papers from researchers, academics, and professionals all over the world.

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