Masamichi MATSUMOTO

Faculty of Engineering, University of Gifu, 1-1, Yanagido, Gifu, 501-11 Japan

(Received September 28, 1994; Accepted May 9, 1995)

With the aid of the time-dependent principle of invariance in a semi-infinite homogeneous atmosphere which scatters radiation anisotropically, an expression of the exact solution to the equation of time-dependent radiative transfer for the diffuse reflection function is obtained in terms of an infinite series, which corresponds to a process of multiple scattering. A statistical interpretation of the exact solution is made by the statistical meaning of the corresponding stationary solution.

Key words : radiative transfer, exact solution, principle of invariance, non-stationary radiation field, semi-infinite atmosphere, anisotropic scattering, statistical interpretation