Optics of a Bifacial Leaf: 2. Light Regime as Affected by the Leaf Structure and the Light Source

Abstract

Abstract— This paper presents a theoretical analysis of the light regime in a bifacial leaf performed on the basis of optical parameters estimated from the measurements of internal light fluxes with optical microprobes. Pathlength distributions, absorptances and gradients of absorption rates are calculated as affected by different aspects of leaf optics and morphology: scattering of tissue layers, overall scattering, surface reflection, thickness and absorption to attenuation ratio in single tissue layers. The in vivo measured transmission spectrum of a leaf is correlated with the in vitro chlorophyll spectrum by accounting for two main disturbing factors: multiple scattering (pathlength statistics) and distributional error (absorption statistics).