DIMENSIONALITY OF THE COHERENCY MATRIX IN POLARIZATION OPTICS

We investigate a generalization of the Wiener-Wolf coherency matrix formalism used for analysis of polarization phenomena. This generalization is served through the use of the spectral decomposition theorem. This new coherency matrix defined as the covariance matrix of the Stokes parameters permits both to describe the effect of any linear scattering medium (depolarizing or not) on the state of polarization and to analyze the coherence properties of fourth order in optical fields. An explicit development is given for the case of gaussian distributed light. We also illustrate this approach by determining the characteristics of a linear modifying polarization interaction (i.e. transmittance, degree of polarization and entropy) in terms of this coherency matrix.