Determination of a Radiance-Coefficient Profile from the Observed Asymmetric Radiance Distribution of an Optically Thin Radiating Medium

Abstract

A hypothetical experiment involving cross spectrographs is described in which the determination of the radiance-coefficient distribution of a circular optically thin asymmetric radiating medium is treated with some rigor. It is then shown that one may start from normal data (i.e., a single mildly asymmetric radiance distribution) and with equal rigor determine a radiance coefficient profile through the flame. Furthermore, it is shown that the solution is surprisingly indifferent to choice of center for reasonable errors of judgment. For purposes of intercomparison a numerical measure of asymmetry is proposed and some mention is made of the numerical techniques employed by the authors which seem to be exceptionally stable.