Related papers: Making geometrical optics exact
As an approximate theory that is highly regarded for its computational efficiency, geometrical optics (GO) is widely used for modeling waves in various areas of physics. However, GO fails at caustics, which significantly limits its…
Ray optics is an intuitive and computationally efficient model for wave propagation through nonuniform media. However, the underlying geometrical-optics (GO) approximation of ray optics breaks down at caustics, erroneously predicting the…
Geometrical optics (GO) is often used to model wave propagation in weakly inhomogeneous media and quantum-particle motion in the semiclassical limit. However, GO predicts spurious singularities of the wavefield near reflection points and,…
The optimization of radiofrequency-wave (RF) systems for fusion experiments is often performed using ray-tracing codes, which rely on the geometrical-optics (GO) approximation. However, GO fails at caustics such as cutoffs and focal points,…
Geometrical optics (GO) is widely used for reduced modeling of waves in plasmas but fails near reflection points, where it predicts a spurious singularity of the wave amplitude. We show how to avoid this singularity by adopting a different…
Even when neglecting diffraction effects, the well-known equations of geometrical optics (GO) are not entirely accurate. Traditional GO treats wave rays as classical particles, which are completely described by their coordinates and…
The concentration of electromagnetic waves (EM) is of utmost importance in many engineering applications such as solar-cells. According to the transformation optics (TO) methodology, a feasible approach for obtaining arbitrary shape…
Waves play an essential role in many aspects of plasma science, such as plasma manipulation and diagnostics. Due to the complexity of the governing equations, approximate models are often necessary to describe wave dynamics. In this…
The design and optimization of radiofrequency-wave systems for fusion applications is often performed using ray-tracing codes, which rely on the geometrical-optics (GO) approximation. However, GO fails at wave cutoffs and caustics. To…
Typical applications of gravitational lensing use the properties of electromagnetic or gravitational waves to infer the geometry through which those waves propagate. Nevertheless, the optical fields themselves - as opposed to their…
An invisibility device should guide light around an object as if nothing were there, regardless where the light comes from. Ideal invisibility devices are impossible due to the wave nature of light. This paper develops a general recipe for…
Non-Euclidean geometry combined with transformation optics has recently led to the proposal of an invisibility cloak that avoids optical singularities and therefore can work, in principle, in a broad band of the spectrum [U. Leonhardt and…
Metaplectic geometrical optics (MGO) is a recently developed ray-tracing framework to accurately compute the wavefield behavior near a caustic (turning point or focal point), where traditional ray-tracing breaks down. However, MGO has thus…
We study propagation of high-frequency electromagnetic waves in a curved spacetime. We demonstrate how a modification of the standard geometric optics allows one to include the helicity dependent corrections into the equations of motion of…
Gravitational wave (GW) astronomy offers the potential to probe the wave-optics regime of gravitational lensing. Wave optics (WO) effects are relevant at low frequencies, when the wavelength is comparable to the characteristic lensing time…
Nowadays the geometric approach in optics is often used to find out media parameters based on propagation paths of the rays because in this case it is a direct problem. However inverse problem in the framework of geometrical optics is…
Optical tweezers have found widespread application in many fields, from physics to biology. Here, we explain in detail how optical forces and torques can be described within the geometrical optics approximation and we show that this…
The basic laws of geometrical optics can be deduced from energy-momentum conservation for electromagnetic waves, without other wave concepts. However, the concept of quanta is required; it arises naturally, hence such a hypothesis could…
We present some new derivations of the effect of a plane gravitational wave on a light ray. A simple interpretation of the results is that a gravitational wave causes a phase modulation of electromagnetic waves. We arrive at this picture…
Metamaterials are beginning to transform optics and microwave technology thanks to their versatile properties that, in many cases, can be tailored according to practical needs and desires. Although metamaterials are surely not the answer to…