Abstract

The trajectory of the energy of a beam of light is the ray; in anisotropic media the direction of the ray is not, in general, normal to the wave front. Angles of incidence, of reflection, and of refraction are the angles which the respective wave normals make with the normal to the surface. Even in anisotropic media the wave normals, which are the directions of beams of light, obey the coplanar law of reflection and refraction.

The limiting direction of a ray in any medium is the boundary surface of the medium. Hence the direction of a beam is not necessarily limited by the boundary surface of the medium. Thus in anisotropic media it is possible to have angles of incidence, of reflection, and of refraction greater than 90° even though light (i.e. energy) still remains inside the medium. Such angles of incidence, of reflection, and of refraction up to 94° have been observed with a cleaved rhomb of calcite. The theoretical calculations and experimental results are reported in this paper.

© 1967 Optical Society of America

Reflection and Refraction of Light at Internal and External Faces of Birefringent Crystals

Valiaparampil C. Varghese
J. Opt. Soc. Am. 57(11) 1351-1361 (1967)

Elliptical Polarization of Refracted Beam in an Optically Nonactive Transparent Liquid, Produced by a Single Incident Beam in Calcite

Valiaparampil C. Varghese
J. Opt. Soc. Am. 57(1) 90-92 (1967)

Studies in Refractive Index. III1

A. M. Taylor and Dorothy A. Durfee
J. Opt. Soc. Am. 23(8) 263-269 (1933)

Specular Reflection and Characteristics of Reflected Light*

Herbert B. Holl
J. Opt. Soc. Am. 57(5) 683-690 (1967)

Theory for Off-Specular Reflection From Roughened Surfaces*

K. E. Torrance and E. M. Sparrow
J. Opt. Soc. Am. 57(9) 1105-1114 (1967)