Intensity fluctuations in biological tissues at any turbulence strength

Abstract

This study investigates the intensity fluctuations of the optical plane and spherical waves in biological tissue that experience any strength of turbulence. Biological tissue is a random and complex medium for optical wave propagation, having a power spectrum reflecting the turbulent characteristics that depend on the structural parameters. It is important to accurately determine the strength of turbulence and classify turbulence regimes for the correct modeling of the behavior of the optical wave propagation. To classify weak, moderate and strong turbulent regimes, closed-form expressions of modified Rytov variances are obtained. Based on the modified Rytov variance that involves the large-scale and small-scale variations, the intensity fluctuations specified by the metric of scintillation index, are calculated versus various parameters such as the propagation distance, refractive index, characteristic length of heterogeneity, small length-scale factor, wavelength, fractal dimension and strength of the refractive index fluctuations. Behavior of optical plane and spherical waves in different turbulent regimes and the comparison of intensity fluctuations in different specimens of human and animal tissues are shown.