Abstract
We experimentally assess the validity of the reverse polar decomposition (R. Ossikovski et al., Opt. Lett. 32, 689 (2007)), which describes any Mueller matrix as a product of a depolarizer, a diattenuator and a retarder with the diattenuator placed after the depolarizer and not before, as in the well-known Lu and Chipman’s forward decomposition. The raw data are Mueller images of a depolarizer (dilute milk at variable concentrations), followed by two tilted glass plates as a diattenuator and a mica retardation plate. While the reverse decomposition accurately reconstructs the component matrices in all cases, the usual forward decomposition provides reasonable values only for the trace of the depolarizer matrix, the other quantities being affected by gross errors. The potential interest of this decomposition for biological samples is briefly discussed.
Highlights
Ten years ago Lu and Chipman [1] proposed a three-factor matrix decomposition of any physical Mueller matrix M based on a generalization of the polar decomposition to the depolarizing case
We apply the forward and reverse decompositions to every measured Mueller matrix image and we evaluate the accuracy of the resulting depolarizer (M∆), diattenuator (MD) and retarder (MR) by comparison with independent data on these matrices
While the reverse decomposition provides a uniform diattenuation as expected the forward decomposition shows a sharp decrease of the diattenuation at the peripheral zone of the figure, where the depolarization is stronger
Summary
Ten years ago Lu and Chipman [1] proposed a three-factor matrix decomposition of any physical Mueller matrix M based on a generalization of the polar decomposition to the depolarizing case. Since this decomposition comprising a diattenuator MD, a retarder MR and a depolarizer M∆ has been widely used in the interpretation of experimental Mueller matrices and, in particular, in imaging polarimetry [2]-[4]. Where the submatrix mD has the form defined in Ref. [1], the retarder matrix has the form MR = (3).
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