Optical properties of turbid media with specularly reflecting boundaries: applications to biological problems

The optical properties of turbid media are formulated in terms of the diffusion equation approximation to linear transport theory. In particular the important effects of specular reflection at bounding surfaces are accurately accounted for by means of explicit boundary conditions at these surfaces. Applications of these results to two problems of biological interest are made. In one a simple multiple scattering model of a leaf is shown to account well for its measured optical properties. In another a method is proposed for finding accurate absorption spectra of pigment-containing cells.