Beam wander characteristics of flat-topped, dark hollow, cos and cosh-Gaussian, J 0 - and I 0 - Bessel Gaussian beams propagating in turbulent atmosphere: a review

Abstract

In this paper we review our work done in the evaluations of the root mean square (rms) beam wander characteristics of the flat-topped, dark hollow, cos-and cosh Gaussian, J 0 -Bessel Gaussian and the I 0 -Bessel Gaussian beams in atmospheric turbulence. Our formulation is based on the wave-treatment approach, where not only the beam sizes but the source beam profiles are taken into account as well. In this approach the first and the second statistical moments are obtained from the Rytov series under weak atmospheric turbulence conditions and the beam size are determined as a function of the propagation distance. It is found that after propagating in atmospheric turbulence, under certain conditions, the collimated flat-topped, dark hollow, cos- and cosh Gaussian, J 0 -Bessel Gaussian and the I 0 -Bessel Gaussian beams have smaller rms beam wander compared to that of the Gaussian beam. The beam wander of these beams are analyzed against the propagation distance, source spot sizes, and against specific beam parameters related to the individual beam such as the relative amplitude factors of the constituent beams, the flatness parameters, the beam orders, the displacement parameters, the width parameters, and are compared against the corresponding Gaussian beam.