Correspondence between correlation functions and enhanced backscattering peak for scattering from smooth random surfaces

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Abstract
We study theoretically the scattering of light from a smooth, two-dimensional, random metal surface, using perturbation theory. We find that there is a good correspondence between the enhanced backscattering intensity function and the cross-polarized amplitude-amplitude correlation function (or the resultant intensity-intensity correlation function). We argue on physical grounds that this mapping should also be valid in the rough surface limit. Such a mapping enables one to have another independent way to measure the information contained in the enhanced backscattering peak about the random rough surface, using correlations of speckle intensities away from the backscattering direction.