High intensity statistics of light propagating in turbulent fluid

I.V. Kolokolov^†^a, b, V.V. Lebedev^‡^a, b
^aLandau Institute for Theoretical Physics, Russian Academy of Sciences, prosp. Akademika Semenova 1A, Chernogolovka, Moscow Region, 142432, Russian Federation
^bHSE University, ul. Myasnitskaya 20, Moscow, 101000, Russian Federation

We present an investigation of the statistical properties of light propagation in a turbulent fluid. Our focus is on the probability density function of the intensity I for different values of I and the beam's path length. The probability density function P(I) exhibits two tails, characterized by stretched exponents, indicating that the likelihood of rare events with intensities much higher than the typical value is significantly higher than naive Gaussian estimates would suggest. We present an analysis of the spatial structure of high-intensity bursts of light.

Keywords: electromagnetic wave propagation, turbulent media, rare events, bright speckles
PACS: 41.20.Jb, 42.25.Dd, 92.60.Ta (all)
DOI: 10.3367/UFNe.2025.05.039934
URL: https://ufn.ru/en/articles/2025/11/e/
Citation: Kolokolov I V, Lebedev V V "High intensity statistics of light propagating in turbulent fluid" Phys. Usp. 68 1112–1130 (2025)

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Received: 24th, March 2025, revised: 17th, May 2025, accepted: 27th, May 2025

Оригинал: Колоколов И В, Лебедев В В «Статистика высоких интенсивностей света, распространяющегося в турбулентной среде» УФН 195 1179–1198 (2025); DOI: 10.3367/UFNr.2025.05.039934