Optically active particles Optical rotation

It is the off-diagonal elements of (13.7) that give rise to cross polarization (S, = = S22) as well as the nonzero elements S13, S14, S23, and S24 in (13.8). That S3 and S4 should be nonzero for optically active particles follows from elementary physical reasoning optical rotatory power in a homogeneous medium causes the direction of vibration to be rotated upon transmission of linearly polarized light by the medium. However, optical activity of the bulk... 

This is the form of the scattering matrix for any medium with rotational symmetry even if all the particles are not identical in shape and composition. A collection of optically active spheres is perhaps the simplest example of a particulate medium which is symmetric under all rotations but not under reflection. Mirror asymmetry in a collection of randomly oriented particles can arise either from the shape of the particles (corkscrews, for example) or from optical activity (circular birefringence and circular dichroism). 

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