Abstract
The fulfillment of the reciprocity by five publicly available scattering programs is investigated for a number of different particles. Reciprocity means that the source and the observation point of a given scattering configuration can be interchanged without changing the result. The programs under consideration are either implementations of T-matrix methods or of the discrete dipole approximation. Similarities and differences concerning their reciprocity behavior are discussed. In particular, it is investigated whether and under which conditions reciprocity tests can be used to evaluate the scattering results obtained by the different programs for the given particles.
Highlights
Elastic scattering of electromagnetic waves on single particles represents a basic physical process of great practical importance in such diverse fields as atmospheric and ocean optics, astrophysics, biomedical optics, material sciences, and nano-optics
Its reliability has been proven in many comparisons with benchmarks and results of other programs as well as in numerous different applications. It is accessible via the German Aerospace Center’s Virtual Laboratory (VL; [19]) for registered users. It is delivered in the book by Rother [10]. mieschka version 1.0.1 of VL has been used in the present investigations
We focused on specific discrete dipole approximation (DDA) and T-matrix implementations, we believe that our study should be seen in a broader context; the results help to establish the reciprocity condition as a useful accuracy test in light scattering computations
Summary
Elastic scattering of electromagnetic waves on single particles represents a basic physical process of great practical importance in such diverse fields as atmospheric and ocean optics, astrophysics, biomedical optics, material sciences, and nano-optics. Corresponding computer programs are sophisticated, tested, and partly publicly available (see, e.g., [12,13,14] for a database of numerous programs hosted by the University of Bremen) They may lead to slightly different numerical results for a given scattering problem. On the other hand there are cases where only one single method exists for treating special scatterer types so that no comparative calculations with alternative methods are possible for validating the results obtained. In all these cases it is up to the user to judge the accuracy and correctness of the findings. Different scattering models can lead to different results in the data processing and to different conclusions
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