Partially coherent light interaction with nano objects

Abstract

Scattering of fully coherent light from nano objects is a very matured field with plethora of applications. However, due to various fundamental and operational reasons, fluctuations in various characteristic features of interacting light fields cannot be fully suppressed. Such light fields with random fluctuating features are known as partially coherent light. When partially coherent light interact with nano-objects (i.e. solids or voids), new characteristics emerge (e.g. coherence vortex, fully-incoherent point-pairs) that are absent in fully coherent scattered fields. In this paper, we review the fundamental metrics for characterising partially coherent light and how such metrics can be used to reveal some of the hidden features of partially coherent light interacting with nano-objects.