Abstract

The angular dependence of the reflectance from an absorbing randomly oriented polydomain medium consisting of domains either small or large compared with the wavelength is investigated. Besides the two conventional cases, where the refractive index of the incidence medium is either smaller or larger than the averaged index of refraction (small-domain limit) or every principal index of refraction of the domains (large-domain limit), we also discuss a third principal case, which exists only in the large-domain limit. In this third case, only one of the principal indices of refraction is larger than that of the incidence medium, while the averaged index of refraction is smaller. Thus, in contrast to the small-domain limit, total reflection is completely suppressed even in the absence of absorption. A characteristic property of such a polydomain medium is its ability to considerably depolarize linear polarized light in spite of being optically isotropic. Additionally, the parallel polarized reflectance $R_p$ can exceed the perpendicular polarized reflectance $R_s$ over certain angle of incidence ranges. Absorption decreases these domain-size-dependent properties, even under the assumption of constant anisotropy. Nevertheless, for materials with low absorption indices, these effects can affect the optical properties significantly.

© 2005 Optical Society of America

Angular dependence of the reflectance from an isotropic polydomain medium: effect of large domain size on total reflection

Thomas G. Mayerhöfer and Jürgen Popp
J. Opt. Soc. Am. A 22(3) 569-573 (2005)

Angular dependence of the specular reflectance from an isotropic polydomain medium with large domains: surprising results regarding Brewster’s angle

Thomas G. Mayerhöfer and Janice L. Musfeldt
J. Opt. Soc. Am. A 22(1) 185-189 (2005)

Employing spectra of polycrystalline materials for the verification of optical constants obtained from corresponding low-symmetry single crystals

Thomas G. Mayerhöfer and Jürgen Popp
Appl. Opt. 46(3) 327-334 (2007)

Influence of total reflection on the imaging quality of optical systems

Antonin Miks, Jiri Novak, and Pavel Novak
J. Opt. Soc. Am. A 22(1) 168-173 (2005)

Reflection and refraction of an arbitrary electromagnetic wave at a plane interface separating an isotropic and a biaxial medium

Jakob J. Stamnes and Glen S. Sithambaranathan
J. Opt. Soc. Am. A 18(12) 3119-3129 (2001)