Radiation transport and internal reflection in a two region, turbid sphere

Abstract

We construct an integral equation for the flux intensity in a scattering and absorbing two-region turbid spherical medium using the integro-differential form of the radiative transfer equation. The sphere is uniformly irradiated by an external source of arbitrary angular distribution and contains a distributed volume source. Anisotropic scattering is accounted for by the transport approximation. The Fresnel boundary conditions, which incorporate reflection and refraction, are used at the outer surface and at the interface between the two regions. In this respect, some new interfacial boundary conditions are introduced. For the special case of a non-scattering medium, we obtain exact solutions for specular reflection. Some numerical examples are given which show qualitative agreement with some recent work of other authors. Of particular interest are the emergent angular distribution and the albedo of the surface as a function of the refractive index and the radii of the two regions. We also draw attention to the fact that the boundary conditions at the interface differ according to the relative values of the refractive indices in the two regions. The interfacial boundary conditions for use in diffusion theory are derived and compared with those of Aronson [Boundary conditions for diffusion of light. J opt Soc Am 1995;12:2532]. In appendix B, we show how diffusion theory may be used to include scattering into the problem in a simple way.