Title

Reflection of a Wave off a Surface

Authors

Brendan Guilfoyle, School of Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics, Institute of Technology, Tralee, Clash, Tralee, Co. Kerry, Ireland.Follow
Wilhelm Klingenberg, Dept. of Mathematical Sciences, University of Durham, Durham, DH1 3LE, United Kingdom

ORCID

0000-0002-7437-5046

Document Type

Preprint

Disciplines

Mathematics | Physical Sciences and Mathematics

Publication Details

Journal of Geometry, vol. 84. © 2006 Springer

Abstract

Recent advances in twistor theory are applied to geometric optics in R 3 . The general formulae for reflection of a wavefront in a surface are derived and in three special cases explicit descriptions are provided: when the reflecting surface is a plane, when the incoming wave is a plane and when the incoming wave is spherical. In each case particular examples are computed exactly and the results plotted to illustrate the outgoing wavefront.

Recommended Citation

Guilfoyle, B., Klingenberg, W. Reflection of a wave off a surface. J. geom. 84, 55–72 (2006). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00022-005-0022-0