We explore the e†ective UV-optical albedos of a variety of types of broad emission line clouds, as well as their possible e†ects on the observed spectra of active galactic nuclei (AGNs). An important albedo source in moderately ionized ionization-bounded clouds is that which is due to neutral hydrogen : Rayleigh scattering of continuum photons o† the extreme damping wings of Lya. The photons re...

Specularly reflected light, or glint, from an ocean surface may provide a useful observational tool for studying extrasolar terrestrial planets. Detection of seasurface glints would differentiate ocean-bearing terrestrial planets, i.e. those similar to Earth, from other terrestrial extrasolar planets. Sea-surface glints are localized and linearly polarized. The brightness and degree of polariza...

The linewidth of longitudinal acoustic waves in densified silica glass is obtained by inelastic x-ray scattering. It increases with a high power alpha of the frequency up to a crossover where the waves experience strong scattering. We find that alpha is at least 4, and probably larger. Resonance and hybridization of acoustic waves with the boson-peak modes seems to be a more likely explanation ...

Apparatus and methods are described for measurement of the polarization dependence of hyper-Rayleigh scattering near 90° scattering angle with 0.1% accuracy for all four configurations where the incident and scattered light is linear polarized either parallel or perpendicular to the scattering plane. Measurements are made with large collection aperture and extrapolated to zero collection numeri...

We investigate the reflectivity and optical scattering characteristics at 1064 nm of an antireflection coated fused silica window of the type being used in the Advanced LIGO gravitational-wave detectors. Reflectivity is measured in the ultra-low range of 5-10 ppm (by vendor) and 14-30 ppm (by us). Using an angle-resolved scatterometer we measure the sample's bidirectional scattering distributio...

This paper contains a self-contained brief presentation of the scattering theory for periodic structures. Its main result is a theorem (the Modified Rayleigh Conjecture, or MRC), which gives a rigorous foundation for a numerical method for solving the direct scattering problem for periodic structures. A numerical example illustrating the procedure is presented.

Raman spectroscopy was developed by C. V. Raman (Figure 1) in 1928, but until recently has been plagued by weak Raman scattering responses compared to strong, interfering, Rayleigh scattering, plus fluorescence interferences. Developments over the past 15 years have permitted Raman spectroscopy to become more useful and easier to use. With these developments, forensic analysis by Raman spectros...

With the realization of coherent, laserlike atoms in the form of Bose-Einstein condensates it has become possible to explore matter-wave amplification, a process in which the number of atoms in a quantum state is amplified due to bosonic stimulation. Stimulation has been observed in the formation of condensates [1,2] and, more directly, has been used to realize coherent matter-wave amplifiers [...