Abstract:
The scintillation index, arising from the intensity fluctuations in weak atmospheric turbulence of annular beams whose individual components are incoherent, is formulated. For such beams whose annularities are obtained by varying the source sizes and magnitudes of the individual beams, evaluations show that at very small sized beam structures, thinner beams possess smaller scintillations. As the sizes increase, the scintillation index values of thick and thin beams approach each other, eventually exhibiting the same scintillation behavior at large sized beam structures. Examination of the intensity fluctuations of the annular beams, whose individual incoherent components are at the same size but at different magnitudes, yield reverse behavior such that at very small sized beam structures, thicker beams possess smaller scintillations, however the scintillation values are very close to each other. Again, for large sized beams, the scintillation index values of thick and thin beams approach each other, eventually exhibiting the same scintillation behavior at large sized beam structures. Comparing the scintillation indices of annular beams whose individual components are incoherent to those of traditional annular beams of coherent components, it seems that for large sized beams, incoherently subtracted beams are advantageous, however the reverse is valid for very small sized beam structures.