Backscatter amplification in a turbulent atmosphere and the law of conservation of energy

Abstract

We demonstrate how energy is redistributed and the law of conservation of energy is fulfilled when optical radiation is reflected in a turbulent atmosphere. It is found that the mean intensity of a laser beam, scattered by a point reflector or an ensemble of point reflectors in a turbulent atmosphere, increases in a strictly backward direction as compared to the intensity of the beam scattered in a homogeneous medium without turbulence—the backscatter amplification (BSA) effect—at the expense of overflow of the energy of the scattered beam from the side directions covering a huge area of several orders of magnitude exceeding the BSA effect localization area.