The Cotton-Mouton effect in gases: Experiment and theory

Abstract

When polarized light passes through a material in the presence of a strong magnetic field, birefringence is observed. This is known as the Cotton-Mouton effect. Owing to the increasing sophistication of both experimental and computational techniques, this particular aspect of magneto-optics has been investigated increasingly in the last few years. In this review the basic facts concerning both experiment and theory are discussed and tables summarizing all currently known gas-phase data are presented.