Reflection of a wave off a surface

Abstract: Recent advances in twistor theory are applied to geometric optics in

{B b b R}^{3}

. The general formulae for reflection of a wavefront in a surface are derived and in three special cases explicit descriptions are provided: when the reflecting surface is a plane, when the incoming wave is a plane and when the incoming wave is spherical. In each case particular examples are computed exactly and the results plotted to illustrate the outgoing wavefront.

Review text

According to Huygens' principle the propagation of light can be described by either tracing the rays or the wavefronts. The authors use properties of the geometry of oriented lines in \(\mathbb R^3\) to switch back and forth between these two descriptions [see the authors, Arch. Math. 82, No. 1, 81--84 (2004; Zbl 1060.51015)]. They give an explicit description of a wavefront reflected off a surface. For point sources this has been answered earlier by \textit{J. B. Keller} and \textit{H. B. Keller} [J. Opt. Soc. Am. 40, 48--52 (1950)] using a completely different approach. The construction presented in the paper under review involves the long known correspondence between the space of oriented affine lines in \(\mathbb R^3\) with the tangent bundle of the 2-sphere. In addition to the general solution explicit formulae are given in the cases when the reflecting surface or the incoming wave is a plane or when the incoming wave is spherical. The paper closes with many applications including the construction of caustics and the Casimir force.

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