Alfredo Luis Departamento de Óptica, Facultad de Ciencias F́ısicas, Universidad Complutense, 28040 Madrid, Spain Abstract We develop a complete geometrical picture of paraxial light propagation including coherence phenomena. This approach applies both for scalar and vectorial waves via the introduction of a suitable Wigner function and can be formulated in terms of an inverted Huygens principle....

We present a novel interferometer for measuring angular distributions of backscattered light. The new system exploits a low-coherence source in a modified Michelson interferometer to provide depth resolution, as in optical coherence tomography, but includes an imaging system that permits the angle of the reference field to be varied in the detector plane by simple translation of an optical elem...

We develop an approach to coherence between two scalar harmonic light vibrations derived from the ensemble interpretation of statistical optics. Coherence is presented as a statistical variable itself that turns out to be the phase difference between the two vibrations. This provides a natural and simple extension of second-order coherence to cover more complicated situations. This includes in ...

We present that multiple mutually independent coherence areas can be used for simultaneous spatial filtering in an imaging platform as effective as pinhole scanning. In this imaging platform, the unique combination of low-spatial-coherence illumination and differential angle imaging allows us to take advantage of low-coherence enhanced-backscattering (LEBS) phenomenon to permit self-generated o...

Spatial field correlation functions represent a key quantity for the description of mesoscopic phenomena in disordered media and the optical characterization of complex materials. Yet many aspects related to the vector nature of light waves have not been investigated so far. We study theoretically the polarization and coherence properties of electromagnetic waves produced by a dipole source in ...

We report on an experimental measurement of the phase shifts associated with the AC Stark effect. The optically induced light shift was measured using a Ramsey fringe technique and we have made detailed studies of the potential sources of coherence loss that can occur for an atomic sample manipulated by light. We investigated the loss of coherence due to the light shifts induced by using a non-...

We elucidate a ray picture of coherence for vectorial electromagnetic waves by using the Stokes parameters for light rays defined by the optical Wigner function. Paraxial propagation is formulated as a complementary Huygens principle. We show that the degrees of coherence are averages of the phase difference where the weights are the Stokes parameters for light rays. We analyze the van Cittert–...

We put forward an experimental configuration to observe transverse Anderson localization of partially coherent light beams with a tunable degree of first-order coherence. The scheme makes use of entangled photons propagating in disordered waveguide arrays, and is based on the unique relationship between the degree of entanglement of a pair of photons and the coherence properties of the individu...

It is shown how surface plasmons that travel between the slits in Young's interference experiment can change the state of spatial coherence of the field that is radiated by the two apertures. Surprisingly, the coherence can both be increased and decreased, depending on the slit separation distance. This results in a modulation of the visibility of the interference fringes. Since many properties...

Coherence-enhanced light harvesting has not been directly observed experimentally, despite theoretical evidence that coherence can significantly enhance light-harvesting performance. The main experimental obstacle the difficulty in isolating effect of presence confounding variables. Recent proposals for externally controlling by manipulating light's degree polarization showed coherent efficienc...