Expand this Topic clickable element to expand a topic
Skip to content
Optica Publishing Group

Ray tracing theory and mirage occurrence conditions

Not Accessible

Your library or personal account may give you access

Abstract

The new ray tracing theory, deduced from geometrical optics and widely developed for radio propagation in cosmic atmospheres, is now applied to optics. This paper is confined to the duct mode propagation which represents a singularity. A narrow horizontal beam emitted inside the waveguide can propagate a long path around the earth with very good periodic focusing: the central circular path coincides with the stratification of the atmosphere while rays above or below it are more or less curved. Perfect symmetry is not needed; but two specific conditions must be satisfied, and their occurrence just coincides with conditions under which mirages occur: a quiet mirage with sharp contours, evidently not much affected by scatter, occurs only during a temperature inversion, above a large hot desert, above a hot rather convex asphalt road, or (under convenient conditions) above a quiet level sea, which means only when favorable conditions establish the very sporadically occurring waveguide. A density maximum need not occur at all.

© 1978 Optical Society of America

Full Article  |  PDF Article
More Like This
Ray tracing through funnel concentrator optics

Chungte William Chen and George W. Hopkins
Appl. Opt. 17(9) 1466-1467 (1978)

Ray tracing evaluation of a technique for correcting the refraction errors in satellite tracking data

C. S. Gardner, J. R. Rowlett, and B. E. Hendrickson
Appl. Opt. 17(19) 3143-3145 (1978)

Moving through a mirage

Peter D. Sozou and George Loizou
Appl. Opt. 33(21) 4644-4651 (1994)

Cited By

You do not have subscription access to this journal. Cited by links are available to subscribers only. You may subscribe either as an Optica member, or as an authorized user of your institution.

Contact your librarian or system administrator
or
Login to access Optica Member Subscription

Figures (2)

You do not have subscription access to this journal. Figure files are available to subscribers only. You may subscribe either as an Optica member, or as an authorized user of your institution.

Contact your librarian or system administrator
or
Login to access Optica Member Subscription

Equations (14)

You do not have subscription access to this journal. Equations are available to subscribers only. You may subscribe either as an Optica member, or as an authorized user of your institution.

Contact your librarian or system administrator
or
Login to access Optica Member Subscription

Select as filters


Select Topics Cancel
© Copyright 2024 | Optica Publishing Group. All Rights Reserved