The magnetochiral effect and related optical phenomena

The magnetochiral effect has only recently been experimentally detected and measured. The interest for the effect lies less in any foreseeable practical application, than rather in the symmetry principles that govern it. In this article we first show how the magnetochiral effect is related to other optical and magneto-optical phenomena, such as natural optical activity, the Faraday, Cotton-Mouton effects and quadratic magnetic field-enhanced optical activity. The general principles of the measurements of magnetochiral birefringence and magnetochiral dichroism are then briefly described. The basic theory of the non-linear-optical, inverse magnetochiral birefringence is presented and possibilities of its detection are explored. The emphasis of this paper lies in the discussion of selection rules and in symmetry considerations. (C) 1999 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.