Transmission and reflection of acoustic waves by an obstacle in a waveguide

By an extension of the null field approach introduced by Waterman the transmission and reflection of acoustic waves by an obstacle in a waveguide are considered. The waveguide is assumed to have a constant cross section but otherwise the geometry is left arbitrary. The scattered field is obtained as a complicated mode sum containing the transition matrix of the obstacle, the reflection matrix of the waveguide wall and the transformation relations between the cylindrical and spherical basis functions. For a circular cross section of the waveguide relatively explicit expressions are given for the transmission and reflection coefficients, and numerical results are shown for spherical and spheroidal obstacles in rotationally symmetric configurations. Several natural extensions of the present results are finally recognized.