Scattering of light from hollow and semi-hollow 3D scatterers with ellipsoidal, cylindrical and cartesian symmetries

Scattering potentials of hollow particles with ellipsoid-, cylinder- and parallelepiped-like shapes and adjustable edge sharpness are introduced as a difference of two 3D multi-Gaussian functions with suitable parameters. The far-zone intensity distributions generated on weak scattering from such potentials are shown to depend on the scatterer’s boundary thickness, edge softness as well as on its size relative to the wavelength. Possible extension to potentials formed by nested shells of the same or different types and potentials with semi-hollow center is outlined.