Visibility in ghost imaging with classical partially polarized electromagnetic beams

Abstract

We consider classical second-order ghost imaging with uniformly partially polarized electromagnetic beams and examine the effect of the degree of polarization of the incident light on the visibility of the image. Closed-form expressions for two previously proposed definitions of visibility are derived. Both results are physically similar and show that the visibility increases with the degree of polarization. Hence, a polarized beam is superior to an unpolarized one to obtain a high-visibility ghost image. Some related issues in recent literature are also addressed.