Spatial correlation properties of apertured partially coherent beams propagating through atmospheric turbulence

The spatial correlation properties of apertured partially coherent beams propagating through atmospheric turbulence are studied in detail. By using the quadratic approximation of the Rytov's phase structure function and the finite complex Gaussian expansion of the aperture function, the closed-form expression for the spectral degree of coherence of apertured partially coherent beams in turbulence is derived. It is shown that the larger the aperture width h is, and the smaller the spatial correlation length sigma(0) of the source is, the less the spatial correlation is affected by turbulence. Specially, the influence of turbulence on the spatial correlation for unapertured partially coherent beams is less than that for apertured ones. The spectral degree of coherence is shown to possess phase singularities for apertured partially coherent beams, but the phase singularities behavior disappears when the turbulence is strong enough, which is very different from the behavior of unapertured partially coherent beams. In addition, a comparison between the width of the spectral degree of coherence and that of the spectral intensity of apertured partially coherent beams in turbulence is also given, and some interesting results are obtained. The results are interpreted physically.