Simulating Optical Scattering in Disordered Media Using KWANT - Working at the Interface Between Electronic Transport Theory and Optics

Abstract

In the past few decades research in light imaging and wave-front shaping techniques have received growing attention. The statistics of the transmission matrix have made it possible to better understand the properties of optical scattering in disordered media and have provided the means to more efficiently propagate light through diffusely scattering media. Experimentally the transmission matrix has successfully been calculated using a spatial light modulator. Numerically, methods for computing the optical transmission matrix exist, however, they are "scattered'' in the literature, not very efficient and not regularly updated. KWANT, an open source python package created to compute simulations of electronic transport experiments, has proven to be highly efficient, easy to use, and well-maintained. Motivated by the similarities between the Schrödinger equation and the Helmholtz equation, we compute an optical scattering experiment simulation using KWANT and show that it can in fact be implemented for research in the field of optics.