GEOMETRICAL APPROACH TO LIGHT IN INHOMOGENEOUS MEDIA

Abstract

Electromagnetism in an inhomogeneous dielectric medium at rest is described using the methods of differential geometry. In contrast to a general relativistic approach the electromagnetic fields are discussed in three-dimensional space only. The introduction of an appropriately chosen three-dimensional metric leads to a significant simplification of the description of light propagation in an inhomogeneous medium: light rays become geodesics of the metric and the field vectors are parallel transported along the rays. The new metric is connected to the usual flat space metric diag[1,1,1] via a conformal transformation leading to new, effective values of the medium parameters [Formula: see text] and [Formula: see text] with [Formula: see text]. The corresponding index of refraction is thus constant and so is the effective velocity of light. Space becomes effectively empty but curved. All deviations from straight-line propagation are now due to curvature. The approach is finally used for a discussion of the Riemann–Silberstein vector, an alternative, complex formulation of the electromagnetic fields.