English

Circular polarization memory in polydisperse scattering media

Classical Physics 2015-06-24 v1 Optics

Abstract

We investigate the survival of circularly polarized light in random scattering media. The surprising persistence of this form of polarization has a known dependence on the size and refractive index of scattering particles, however a general description regarding polydisperse media is lacking. Through analysis of Mie theory, we present a means of calculating the magnitude of circular polarization memory in complex media, with total generality in the distribution of particle sizes and refractive indices. Quantification of this memory effect enables an alternate pathway towards recovering particle size distribution, based on measurements of diffusing circularly polarized light.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.1502.07592,
  title  = {Circular polarization memory in polydisperse scattering media},
  author = {Callum M. Macdonald and Steven L. Jacques and Igor Meglinski},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1502.07592},
  year   = {2015}
}

Comments

5 pages, 4 figures, accepted for Physical Review E

R2 v1 2026-06-22T08:38:53.305Z