Radiative characteristics of beds made of large spheres containing an absorbing and scattering medium

The aim of this paper is to characterize the extinction coefficient, the scattering albedo and the scattering phase function of beds made of spherical particles containing an absorbing and scattering medium. The radiative properties of the medium contained in the particles are assumed to be known. Moreover, the particles in the bed are large compared to the wavelength considered and are supposed to be sufficiently distant from each other to scatter radiation independently. Thus, the characteristics of the whole bed can be determined from the properties of the particles alone. These properties are computed using a Monte Carlo procedure which simulates the interaction of one particle with a plane incident wave. The characteristics of the whole bed are determined using the independent scattering theory by adding the contributions of each particle. The evolutions of these characteristics with the properties of the inside medium, the porosity of the bed and the radius of the particles are investigated. (c) 2005 Elsevier SAS. All rights reserved.