Electromagnetic scattering in clouds

Abstract

Techniques used to explain the nature of the optical effects of clouds on the light produced by lightning include a Monte Carlo simulation, an equivalent medium approach, and methods based on Boltzmann transport theory. A cuboidal cloud has been considered using transform methods and a diffusion approximation. Many simplifying assumptions have been used by authors to make this problem tractable. In this report, the cloud will have a spherical shape and its interior will consist of a uniform distribution of identical spherical water droplets. The source will be modeled as a Hertz dipole, electric or magnetic, inside or outside the cloud. An impulsive source is used. Superposition may be employed to obtain a sinusoid within an envelope which describes a lightning event. The problem is investigated by transforming to the frequency domain, obtaining Green's functions, and then using the Cagniard-DeHoop method to symbolically recover the time domain solution.