Scattering by Spheroidal and Rough Particles.

We live in a world rich in the phenomena of electromagnetic scattering; the blue of the sky, the wonderful colors of colloidal suspensions, rainbows, and, indeed, almost every visual experience is the result of scattering. Curious and analytical minds have been attracted to the scientific explanation of these phenomena in terms of the physical processes involved. This effort, which has been continued from ancient times, has evolved into light scattering studies of academic as well as practical interests. Gradually, it was realized that under most circumstances the total scattered light and also the observed polarization could be estimated from the simple sum of the scattered light from the individual particles in a given medium. This is the so-called single-particle scattering approach. Furthermore, each single scattering was found to be completely determined by the particle size in comparison with the wavelength of the incident wave, its shape, its index of refraction, and the particle orientation with respect to the incident polarization.