Computer simulation of superposed coherent and chaotic radiation

A computer simulation technique useful for generating superposed coherent and chaotic radiation of arbitrary spectral shape is described. Its advantages over other techniques include flexibility and ease of implementation, as well as the capability of incorporating spectral characteristics that cannot be generated by other methods. We discuss the implementation of the technique and present results to demonstrate its validity. The technique can be used to obtain numerical solutions to photon statistics problems through computer simulation. We furthermore argue that experiments involving photon statistics can be carried out using a wideband source in place of an amplitude-stabilized source whenever the spectral characteristics of the source are not important. Experimental results that corroborate the argument are presented.