Polarization

Polarization refers to the orientation of

Electric Field oscillations

The -waves are linearly polarized

along the axis of the transmitter
diode.

The detector receives only the

component of the incident -wave When a linear polarizer is used,
parallel to the axis of the detector nearly all incident light is converted
diode. to linearly polarized light.

Unfortunately, there is no way to

detect to what extent light is actually
polarized without a second polarizer
(analyzer).

We used the receiver for this.

 Polarization
When the analyzer’s transmission
axis is aligned with that of the
polarizer, the maximum intensity
passes through.

When the analyzer is rotated 90° to

this, most of the light is absorbed
and the minimum intensity is
attained.

When the receiver and transmitter The percentage of polarized

are perpendicular, with a polarizer at light (V) Vis then
maxI  I given by:
min
I max  I min
angle  between them, the resulting
intensity is detected as:

I = I0 cos sin

which is a max for  = 45 degrees

 Polarization

INCIDENT
A Mechanical Analogy…
 Force pushes down on block
 Plane changes incident force’s
direction by “absorbing” some of the D
TE

AB
incident force I T

SO
M
NS

RB
A
 Block moves parallel to plane’s TR

ED
“transmission axis”

Initial Polarization Polarizer at 45 Degrees Receiver at 90

Of Transmitted Degrees
Wave To Transmitter
TR
A
N

RECEIVED
SM
INCIDENT

IT
TE

IGNORED
D

IN
CI
ED

D
B

EN
1 2 3
R
O

T
S
B
A
 Polarization
The transmitted wave hits the polarizer which breaks
up the incoming wave into perpendicular components
based on the angle of the polarizer’s transmission
axis. The polarizer transmits the component parallel
to the transmission axis and absorbs the component
perpendicular to the transmission axis. The
magnitude of the transmitted wave is the same as the
magnitude of the component parallel to the
transmission axis (take the dot product: it’s 1/2 of the
original for a polarizer at 60deg). The receiver then
receives the component parallel to its axis of
reception and ignores the component perpendicular
to this.
 Polarization
Resulting Intensity of Polarized light is given by Malus’ Law:
Polarization and Malus' Law

Data Malus' Law

Graph 0.8
Malus’ Law:
Intensity (V)

0.6
I = I0cos2
0.4

0.2

0
0 20 40 60 80 100 120 140 160 180

Angle between Transmitter axis and Receiver axis (deg)

The -waves were found to be 98% polarized from the

transmitter,
but the wire polarizers, when used, were only 76% effective.
Polarization
… via Rayleigh Scattering
A wave packet incident on a
small particle (</15) causes
electron oscillations, creating a
dipole.

Light is re-emitted in a random

direction, polarized parallel to
the dipole oscillation axis.

Incoming light undergoes the

maximum polarization at 90°
from the angle of incidence.
Polarization
… via Rayleigh
Scattering
 Atoms and molecules in the upper
atmosphere are <1nm in size, so
they can scatter light in the visible
spectrum (~400nm<<~700nm)

 The intensity of the scattered light

increases with with (1/)4, so the
intensity of blue light scattered by the
atmosphere is much greater than
that of red light.

 Therefore, we have blue skies, red

sunsets, and polarized light 90° from
the sun.