Boundary value problem for the radiation transfer equation with diffuse reflection and refraction conditions (Q376508)

The paper deals with the existence and uniqueness of the radiation intensity \(I\) at a point \(x\) in a smooth bounded three-dimensional domain, which is constituted by semitransparent bodies separated by the vacuum, when the radiation propagates along a direction \(\omega\in S_1(0)\subset\mathbb{R}^3\), that is, \(I\) is the solution of the radiation transfer equation: \(\omega\cdot\nabla I+(\varkappa +s) I=s\mathcal{S}(I)+\varkappa k^2 F\) defined for almost everywhere, under diffuse reflection and refraction boundary conditions. The scattering operator \(\mathcal{S}\) verifies \(\mathcal{S}(1)=1\), \(\int_{S_1(0)}\mathcal{S}(I)d\omega=\int_{S_1(0)}Id\omega\), and \(|\mathcal{S}(I)|^p \leq \mathcal{S}(|I|^p)\). The coefficients \(\varkappa\), \(s\), and \(k\) denote the absorption, the scattering coefficient, and the refraction exponent, respectively, which are assumed to be constant at each semitransparent medium. The function \(F(\omega,x)\) characterizes the density of the radiation of volume sources. The existence of the solution is obtained by an iteration procedure.