Applications of the Wigner distribution function to partially coherent light beams

The paper presents a review of the Wigner distribution function--its definition and its most important properties-- and of some of its applications to optical problems, in particular to the description of partially coherent light beams and to the propagation of such light beams through first-order optical ABCD-systems. Special attention is paid to Gaussian beams and to second-order moments of general, partially coherent light.© (1999) COPYRIGHT SPIE--The International Society for Optical Engineering. Downloading of the abstract is permitted for personal use only.