INTENSITY CORRECTIONS IN A RANDOM MEDIUM IN THE NEIGHBORHOOD OF A CAUSTIC

The two-scale expansion developed previously is applied to solve the equation governing the propagation of the coherence function in a random medium with a mean speed-to-sound profile. A formula is obtained for the vertical intensity distribution, resulting from an acoustic beam propagating in a statistically homogeneous, isotropic random medium with channel velocity profile. This formula is used to calculate the intensity distribution in the vicinity of a caustic in two limiting cases: weak scattering and strong scattering. A numerical example is presented.