Anomalous polarization effects during light scattering in random media

The dependence of the intensity of light backscattered from a layer of a randomly inhomogeneous medium on the polarization of incident light and the size of scatterers has been investigated. The results of numerical simulation have demonstrated that the direction of rotation of the plane of polarization is different in systems with small- and large-scale inhomogeneities. It is shown for the first time that the dependence of the sign of the residual circular polarization on the size of scatterers can be observed in systems described by the Henyey-Greenstein phase function used in simulating biological tissues. A similar anomalous polarization effect, which consists in changing the direction of rotation of the plane of polarization of backscattered light with an increase in the scattering angle, is revealed in studying the coherent backscattering component. These polarization effects are observed in light backscattering from optically active media.