Analysis of Mie resonances using the Debye series.

Scattering of light from homogeneous spherical particles can exhibit sharp resonances as functions of particle size, wavelength, or refractive index. Such resonances, usually known as morphology-dependent resonances or whispering gallery modes, have been exhaustively studied using Mie theory. This paper demonstrates that the Debye series expansion provides a succinct and easily understood representation of these resonances: For example, the Debye coefficient Rn121 determines (a) the exact conditions for resonance, (b) the number of terms required to replicate the Mie result, and (c) the Q-factor of the resonance.

Simultaneous observation of a glory and in-situ microphysical cloud properties.

While making airborne measurements of cloud particles, a bright glory was observed on a thin layer cloud. By deliberately flying through this glory-producing cloud on several occasions, cloud particle size distributions were obtained. We found that warm liquid clouds with narrow cloud droplet size distributions are responsible for producing the observed glory. This paper presents these results and compares the results of Mie theory simulations with an image of the glory.

Transmission bows of radially inhomogeneous spheres.

We consider transmission scattering of a plane wave by a radially inhomogeneous sphere containing a localized region of refractive index decrease. In ray theory, the boundary conditions on the deflection angle at axial and grazing incidence determine that transmission scattering gives rise to an even number of bows, half of them being relative maximum bows and half being relative minimum bows. For a model refractive index profile, we determine the conditions under which different numbers of bows occur, and we suggest physical mechanisms responsible for producing them. We also verify that these bows occur in wave scattering in the short wavelength limit, both in the frequency domain and time domain.

Iridescent clouds and distorted coronas.

Near-forward scattering of sunlight generates coronas and iridescence on clouds. Coronas are caused by diffraction, whereas iridescence is less easily explained. Iridescence often appears as bands of color aligned with the edges of clouds or as apparently random patches of color on clouds. This paper suggests that iridescence is due to interference between light that has been diffracted by a spherical droplet of water and light that has been transmitted through the same droplet.

Supernumerary arcs of rainbows: Young's theory of interference.

Supernumerary arcs on rainbows are historically important because in the early 1800s they provided evidence in favor of the wave theory of light. The success of Airy's rainbow integral has overshadowed the earlier contribution from Young, who proposed that supernumerary arcs were caused by interference between two geometrical rays that emerge from the raindrop at the same scattering angle. Airy dismissed Young's idea as "the imperfect theory of interference" because it predicted supernumerary arcs at the wrong angles. Young was unaware that a light ray encountering a focal line can suffer a phase shift of 90°. If these phase shifts are taken into account, the theory of interference becomes surprisingly accurate.

Light and color in the open air-introduction to the feature issue.

This feature issue reports recent progress in scientific understanding of optical phenomena in the natural world, visible to the naked eye. The issue contains papers largely arising from presentations given at the 12th International Conference on Light and Color in Nature, held at the University of Granada from 31 May to 3 June 2016.

Re-visiting the atmospheric corona.

The atmospheric corona is a well-known diffraction phenomenon, typically seen as colored rings surrounding the Sun or Moon. In many respects, Fraunhofer diffraction provides a good explanation of the corona. As the angular sizes of the corona's rings are inversely proportional to the radius, r, of the spherical particles causing the corona, it should be easy to estimate the particle size from observations and photographs. Noting that some of the techniques commonly used for particle sizing based on diffraction theory can give misleading results for coronas caused by the scattering of sunlight, this paper uses Mie theory simulations to demonstrate that the inner 3 red rings of the corona have angular radii of θ≈16/r, 31/r, and 47/r, when θ is measured in degrees and r is measured in µm.

Light and color in the open air: Introduction to the feature issue.

This is a feature issue devoted to optical phenomena in nature. Many of the papers published in this feature issue are based on presentations given at the "Light & Color in Nature" conference held in August 2013 at the University of Alaska-Fairbanks.

Color-coordinate system from a 13th-century account of rainbows.

We present a new analysis of Robert Grosseteste's account of color in his treatise De iride (On the Rainbow), dating from the early 13th century. The work explores color within the 3D framework set out in Grosseteste's De colore [see J. Opt. Soc. Am. A29, A346 (2012)], but now links the axes of variation to observable properties of rainbows. We combine a modern understanding of the physics of rainbows and of human color perception to resolve the linguistic ambiguities of the medieval text and to interpret Grosseteste's key terms.

Understanding light scattering by a coated sphere part 1: theoretical considerations.

Although scattering of light by a coated sphere is much more complicated than scattering by a homogeneous sphere, each of the partial wave amplitudes for scattering of a plane wave by a coated sphere can be expanded in a Debye series. The Debye series can then be rearranged in terms of the various reflections that each partial wave undergoes inside the coated sphere. For a given number of internal reflections, it is found that many different Debye terms produce the same scattered intensity as a function of scattering angle. This is called path degeneracy. In addition, some of the ray trajectories are repeats of those occurring for a smaller number of internal reflections in the sense that they produce identical time delays as a function of scattering angle. These repeated paths, however, have a different intensity as a function of scattering angle than their predecessors. The degenerate paths and repeated paths considerably simplify the interpretation of scattering within the coated sphere, thus making it possible to catalog the contributions of the various paths.

Understanding light scattering by a coated sphere part 2: time domain analysis.

Numerical computations were made of scattering of an incident electromagnetic pulse by a coated sphere that is large compared to the dominant wavelength of the incident light. The scattered intensity was plotted as a function of the scattering angle and delay time of the scattered pulse. For fixed core and coating radii, the Debye series terms that most strongly contribute to the scattered intensity in different regions of scattering angle-delay time space were identified and analyzed. For a fixed overall radius and an increasing core radius, the first-order rainbow was observed to evolve into three separate components. The original component faded away, while the two new components eventually merged together. The behavior of surface waves generated by grazing incidence at the core/coating and coating/exterior interfaces was also examined and discussed.

Visibility of natural tertiary rainbows.

Naturally occurring tertiary rainbows are extraordinarily rare and only a handful of reliable sightings and photographs have been published. Indeed, tertiaries are sometimes assumed to be inherently invisible because of sun glare and strong forward scattering by raindrops. To analyze the natural tertiary's visibility, we use Lorenz-Mie theory, the Debye series, and a modified geometrical optics model (including both interference and nonspherical drops) to calculate the tertiary's (1) chromaticity gamuts, (2) luminance contrasts, and (3) color contrasts as seen against dark cloud backgrounds. Results from each model show that natural tertiaries are just visible for some unusual combinations of lighting conditions and raindrop size distributions.

Time domain analysis of scattering by a water droplet.

Rainbows, coronas and glories are caused by the scattering of sunlight from water droplets in the atmosphere. Although these optical phenomena are seen fairly frequently, even scientifically minded people sometimes struggle to provide explanations for their formation. This paper offers explanations of these phenomena based on numerical computations of the scattering of a 5 fs pulse of red light by a spherical droplet of water. The results reveal the intricate details of the various scattering mechanisms, some of which are essentially undetectable except in the time domain.

Light and color in the open air: introduction to the feature issue.

This is a feature issue devoted to optical phenomena that can be observed in nature, primarily with the naked eye. Many of the papers published in this feature issue are based on presentations given at the "Light & Color in Nature" conference held in June 2010 at St. Mary's College of Maryland.

Mie scattering in the time domain. Part 1. The role of surface waves.

We computed the Debye series p=1 and p=2 terms of the Mie scattered intensity as a function of scattering angle and delay time for a linearly polarized plane wave pulse incident on a spherical dielectric particle and physically interpreted the resulting numerical data. Radiation shed by electromagnetic surface waves plays a prominent role in the scattered intensity. We determined the surface wave phase and damping rate and studied the structure of the p=1,2 surface wave glory in the time domain.

Mie scattering in the time domain. Part II. The role of diffraction.

The p=0 term of the Mie-Debye scattering amplitude contains the effects of external reflection and diffraction. We computed the reflected intensity in the time domain as a function of the scattering angle and delay time for a short electromagnetic pulse incident on a spherical particle and compared it to the predicted behavior in the forward-focusing region, the specular reflection region, and the glory region. We examined the physical consequences of three different approaches to the exact diffraction amplitude, and determined the signature of diffraction in the time domain. The external reflection surface wave amplitude gradually replaces the diffraction amplitude in the angular transition region between forward-focusing and the region of specular reflection. The details of this replacement were studied in the time domain.

Effects of refractive index on glories.

Atmospheric glories are caused by backscattering of sunlight from spherical droplets of water (e.g., from fog or clouds). But what would glories look like if they were caused by scattering from more exotic substances, such as clouds of ethane as found on Titan? Examining backscattering as a function of the refractive index n of spherical droplets leads to the surprising conclusion that a glory's appearance is almost independent of n (at least for 1.03

Noncircular glories and their relationship to cloud droplet size.

The atmospheric glory caused by backscattering of sunlight from clouds usually has circular colored rings. However, glories with noncircular rings are frequently observed, especially along the edges of clouds. Noting that the angular radius of the rings of glories is a sensitive indicator of the size of the water droplets in clouds, several images of glories have been examined in an attempt to explain the formation of noncircular glories.

Rainbows from inhomogeneous transparent spheres: a ray-theoretic approach.

A ray-theoretic account of the passage of light through a radially inhomogeneous transparent sphere has been used to establish the existence of multiple primary rainbows for some refractive index profiles. The existence of such additional bows is a consequence of a sufficiently attractive potential in the interior of the drop, i.e., the refractive index gradient should be sufficiently negative there. The profiles for which this gradient is monotonically increasing do not result in this phenomenon, but nonmonotone profiles can do so, depending on the form of n. Sufficiently oscillatory profiles can lead to apparently singular behavior in the deviation angle (within the geometrical optics approximation) as well as multiple rainbows. These results also apply to systems with circular cylindrical cross sections, and may be of value in the field of rainbow refractometry.

Atmospheric glories: simulations and observations.

Mie theory can be used to provide full-color simulations of atmospheric glories. Comparison of such simulations with images of real glories suggests that most glories are caused by spherical water droplets with radii between 4 and 25 microm. This paper also examines the appearance of glories taking into account the size of the droplets and the width of the droplet size distributions. Simulations of glories viewed through a linear polarizer compare well with the few available pictures, but they show some features that need corroboration by more observations.