Localization of light by magnetically tuned correlated disorder: Trapping of light in ferrofluids

TL;DR

This paper demonstrates that correlated disorder in ferrofluids can minimize light's mean free path, enabling wave localization and light trapping, tunable via magnetic fields, with implications for controlling light in disordered media.

Contribution

It introduces a model showing how correlated disorder in ferrofluids can induce light localization and trapping, tunable by magnetic fields, advancing understanding of wave behavior in disordered systems.

Findings

Minimum mean free path occurs at correlation length comparable to wavelength.

The minimum mean free path satisfies the Ioffe-Regel criterion for localization.

Magnetic field induces anisotropy affecting light scattering and localization.

Abstract

The mean free path of light ($l^*$) calculated for elastic scattering on a system of nanoparticles with spatially correlated disorder is found to have a minimum when the correlation length is of the order of the wavelength of light. For a typical choice of parameters for the scattering system, this minimum mean free path ($l^*_{min}$) turns out to satisfy the Ioffe-Regel criterion for wave localization, $l^*_{min} \sim \lambda$, over a range of the correlation length, defining thus a stop-band for light transmission. It also provides a semi-phenomenological explanation for several interesting findings reported recently on the transmission/ reflection and the trapping/storage of light in a magnetically tunable ferrofluidic system. The subtle effect of structural anisotropy, induced by the external magnetic field on the scattering by the medium, is briefly discussed in physical terms of the anisotropic Anderson localization.