Gaussian-beam propagation in generic anisotropic wave-number profiles

Abstract

The propagation characteristics of a scalar Gaussian beam in a homogeneous anisotropic medium are considered. The medium is described by a generic wave-number profile wherein the field is formulated by a Gaussian plane-wave distribution and the propagation is obtained by saddle-point asymptotics to extract the Gaussian beam phenomenology in the anisotropic environment. The resultant field is parameterized in terms of e.g., the spatial evolution of the Gaussian beam's curvature, beam width, which are mapped to local geometrical properties of the generic wave-number profile.