Abstract

Laser propagation through the atmosphere produces random scintillation patterns. The statistics of these intensity fluctuations is determined by the refractive index spectrum of the atmosphere ${\Phi }_n\left(\overrightarrow{\text{q}}\right)$ where $\overrightarrow{\text{q}}$ denotes spatial wavenumber. Tatarskii proposed the following model for the turbulence spectrum¹ where $C_n{}^2$ is a measure of the level of turbulence and l₀ is proportional to the inner scale λ₀(λ₀=2.95l₀). The inner scale is defined as the intercept of the two power law regions of the three dimensional structure function of refractive index fluctuations.

© 1987 Optical Society of America