When light intercepts an obstacle it will be scattered, and measurement of the amplitude and polarization properties of the scattered light at various angles relative to the incident beam can provide important structural and dynamic information about a material. Figure 4.1 describes the basic light scattering experiment. Incident light with an electric field E _i is incident on a scattering object and scatters light E _s at a scattering angle ? relative to the incident light direction. The wave vectors k _i and k _s define the propagation direction of the incident and scattering fields. The vector X specifics the point of measurement. The vector x ? scales with the size of the scattering object.

Figure 4.1: The basic light scattering experiment.

The treatment of light scattering in this monograph is found in three chapters. The present chapter discusses total intensity light scattering where the time-averaged intensity of scattered light is measured and k _i = k _s. Dynamic light scattering, where time correlations of the light scattered from fluctuations in the sample are measured, is covered in Chapter 6. Raman scattering, which results from vibrational modes in the sample is distinguished from the latter two processes in that k _i ? k _s and can be used to determine spectroscopic measurements of orientation dynamics. This phenomena is discussed in section 5.4.