Transverse components of the radiation force on nonspherical particles in the [formula omitted]-matrix formalism

Abstract

In the framework of the transition matrix approach, we calculate the force exerted by a plane wave (radiation force) on a dispersion of nonspherical particles modeled as aggregates of spheres. Beyond the customary radiation pressure we also consider the components of the radiation force in a plane orthogonal to the direction of incidence of the incoming wave (transverse components). Our calculations show that, although the latter are generally smaller than the radiation pressure, they are in no way negligible and may be important for some applications, e.g. when studying the dynamics of cosmic dust grains. We also calculate the ensemble average of the components of the radiation force over the orientation of the particles in two physically significant cases: the case of random distribution and the case in which the orientations are randomly distributed around an axis fixed in space (axial average). As expected, we find that, unlike the case of random orientation, the transverse components do not vanish for axial average.