Abstract

Chirally asymmetric responses of a gyrotropic medium to left and right circularly polarized light as manifested in specular light reflection are systematically identified and interpreted. Experimental configurations using one or more photoelastic modulators and synchronous detection are described, by means of which the chiral asymmetries should be measurable with a sensitivity comparable with that of light-transmission techniques. Measurement of these chiral asymmetries would (a) provide experimental tests of recently proposed Fresnel scattering amplitudes for isotropic chiral media and (b) open up new spectroscopic possibilities for the investigation of nontransparent gyrotropic media.

© 1988 Optical Society of America

Light reflection from a naturally optically active birefringent medium

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