Phase-Space Propagator for Partially Coherent Wave Fields in the Spatial Domain

TL;DR

The paper introduces a novel phase-space propagator that efficiently models the free space propagation of partially coherent wave fields in the spatial domain, reducing computational complexity and unifying near and far-field calculations.

Contribution

It presents a new phase-space propagator method that simplifies and unifies the propagation of partially coherent wave fields in free space.

Findings

The PS propagator accurately predicts wavefield behavior in free space.

It reduces computational resources compared to traditional methods.

The approach is applicable to near and far-field regions without different techniques.

Abstract

The propagation of wave fields and their interactions with matter are important for established and emerging fields in optical sciences. Efficient methods for predicting such behaviour have been employed routinely for coherent sources. However, most real world optical systems exhibit partial coherence, for which the present mathematical description involves high dimensional complex functions and hence poses challenges for numerical implementations. This demands significant computational resources to determine the properties of partially coherent wavefields. Here, we describe the novel Phase-Space (PS) propagator, an efficient and self-consistent technique for free space propagation of wave fields which are partially coherent in the spatial domain. The PS propagator makes use of the fact that the propagation of a wave field in free space is equivalent to a shearing of the corresponding PSD function. Computationally, this approach is simpler and the need for using different propagation methods for near and far-field regions is removed.