Radiative transfer

Community Radiative Transfer Model (CRTM) The CRTM is composed of four important modules for gaseous transmittance, surface emission and reflection, cloud and aerosol absorption and scattering, and a solver for a radiative transfer. The CRTM was designed to meet users' needs.

Radiative transfer. radiative transfer in non-isothermal, vertically inhomogeneous, but horizontally homogeneous media. It can treat thermal emission, absorption, and scattering with an arbitrary phase function covering the electromagnetic spectrum from the ultra-violet to radio. The medium may be driven by parallel or isotropic diffuse radiation

Radiative transfer by Chandrasekhar, S. (Subrahmanyan), 1910-Publication date 1960 Topics Astrophysics, Radiation Publisher New York : Dover Publications Collection inlibrary; printdisabled; trent_university; internetarchivebooks Contributor Internet Archive Language English. 393 p. :

The development of the Community Radiative Transfer Model (CRTM) and its subsequent improvements have created a better method for NWP models to assimilate satellite measurements made under all weather conditions. The CRTM was developed by the U.S. Joint Center for Satellite Data Assimilation (JCSDA) to provide fast, accurate satellite radiance ...Earth's longwave thermal radiation intensity, from clouds, atmosphere and surface.. In the study of heat transfer, radiative cooling is the process by which a body loses heat by thermal radiation.As Planck's law describes, every physical body spontaneously and continuously emits electromagnetic radiation.. Radiative cooling has been applied in various contexts throughout human history ...Gustav Kirchhoff (1824–1887). In heat transfer, Kirchhoff's law of thermal radiation refers to wavelength-specific radiative emission and absorption by a material body in thermodynamic equilibrium, including radiative exchange equilibrium.It is a special case of Onsager reciprocal relations as a consequence of the time reversibility of microscopic …Transferring photos from your Android device to your computer is a great way to keep them safe and organized. Whether you want to back up your photos or just want to free up some space on your phone, this guide will show you the easiest way...Have you earned college credits from a nationally accredited school and now want to transfer them to a school with regional accreditation? Updated April 14, 2023 thebestschools.org is an advertising-supported site. Featured or trusted partn...International remittances worth $1 billion are processed monthly. This has consequently improved the value of transactions between banks and mobile money platforms to $68 billion. Here are the best platforms to consider for international mo...Aug 20, 2021 · Importance of Radiative Transfer. Radiation has a very prominent role in astrophysics, both as the only observable and also as a dominant mechanism for energy transfer within and out of astrophysical systems. Consequently, its transport through a medium is one of the most fundamental processes that needs to be considered.

5 sie 2014 ... Because the radiative transfer equation demonstrates macroscopic phenomena of radiation, the intensity law from geometric optics has been used ...Over the past decades, various radiative transfer models that employ different numerical solution techniques have been developed and used to address a wide range of problems related to the optics ...Radiative Transfer. Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar. Courier Corporation, Jan 1, 1960 - Science - 393 pages. This book by a Nobel Laureate provides the foundation for analysis of stellar atmospheres, planetary illumination, and sky radiation. Radiation transfer has been investigated as a phenomenon of astrophysics, and it has attained wider interest ...The radiative transfer simulation within B-cluster has been developed based on an efficient Monte Carlo path-tracing algorithm and implemented in the LargE-Scale remote sensing data and image ...A 1-D version of the atmospheric radiative transfer model, MCARaTS (Iwabuchi, 2006), was incorporated to simulate the atmosphere-forest radiation interaction. A longwave radiative transfer module was then added, together with energy balance and plant physiology modules (Fig. 1a; Kobayashi et al., 2012; Baldocchi and Harley, 1995). All these ...Radiative transfer equation (RTE) is the governing equation of radiation propa-gation in participating media, which plays a central role in the analysis of radiative transfer in gases, semitransparent liquids and solids, porous materials, and particulate media, and is important in many scientific and engineering disciplines. There are different forms of RTEs that …Radiative transfer (RT) simulation based on reconstructed 3-dimensional (3D) vegetation scenarios can promote the validation and development of various retrieval algorithms to monitor the growing ...Radiative transfer describes how radiation is transformed along its path through absorption, emission, and scattering. Radiative transfer codes are a key component of weather and climate models, and they cover a large range of varying complexities. Here we will cover the key concepts needed to understand the effect of radiation on the thermal ...

Dec 29, 2015 · The radiative transfer theory, also called transport theory, is the theory describing the wave propagation through a medium characterized by a random distribution of scatterers. It usually applies to electromagnetic radiation, but it can be generalized to acoustic radiation. The radiative transfer theory is one of the two theories developed to ... The radiative transfer theory, also called transport theory, is the theory describing the wave propagation through a medium characterized by a random distribution of scatterers. It usually applies to electromagnetic radiation, but it can be generalized to acoustic radiation. The radiative transfer theory is one of the two theories developed to ...Radiative transfer in diesel engines has received little attention, although the subject is not new (Mengüç et al. 1985), and the few works that addressed this topic are surveyed in Modest and Haworth . This reference discusses also radiative transfer in high-speed propulsion systems.An Introduction to Radiative Transfer applies these techniques to stellar atmospheres, planetary nebulae, supernovae, and other objects with similar geometrical and physical conditions. Accurate ...The radiative transfer equation, including multiple scattering, is formulated and solved for several prototype problems, using both simple approximate and accurate numerical methods. In addition, the reader has access to a powerful, state-of-the-art computational code for simulating radiative transfer processes in coupled atmosphere-water ...

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Radiative transfer equation (RTE) is the commonly accepted continuum scale governing equation for radiative heat transfer in particulate system. However, its applicability is questionable for non ...Planck's equation for the spectral brightness Bν of blackbody radiation is usually written in the simpler form. Bν(ν, T) = 2hν3 c2 1 exp(hν kT) - 1. The corresponding brightness per unit wavelength Bλ follows from Equation 2.5; it can be written either as a function of frequency: Bλ(λ, T) = 2hc2 λ5 1 exp( hc λkT) - 1.To associate your repository with the radiative-transfer topic, visit your repo's landing page and select "manage topics." GitHub is where people build software. More than 100 million people use GitHub to discover, fork, and contribute to over 330 million projects. The Planck's thermal emission function, the reflectivity-emissivity decoupled Kirchhoff's law and the associated atmospheric radiative transfer equation (RTE) is a theoretical base for Earth surface temperature (ST) retrievals from spaceborne infrared imageries. The infrared (IR) instruments generally collect band averaged radiance which are usually different from the RT codes simulated ...

Radiative transfer in clouds is a challenging task, due to their high spatial and temporal variability which is unrivaled by any other atmospheric species. Clouds are among the main modulators of ...SBDART is a software tool that computes plane-parallel radiative transfer in clear and cloudy conditions within the earth's atmosphere and at the surface. All important processes that affect the ultraviolet, visible, and infrared radiation fields are included. The code is a marriage of a sophisticated discrete ordinate radiative transfer module, low-resolution atmospheric transmission models ...1 Publications about 3D radiative transfer in cloudy atmospheres This list was created as part of the I3RC project. To include additional references, please send a message to Tamás Várnai. 2023 2022 2021 2020 2019 2018 2017 2016 2015 2014 2013 2012 2011 2010 2009Radiative Forcings. Atmospheric radiative transfer is the science of understanding how electromagnetic radiation emitted by both the Sun and Earth interacts with the gases, clouds and particles making up our atmosphere. The changes in energy due to these interactions are responsible for many variations in temperature and weather that we ...1.1 Radiative Transfer in Gaseous Medium. The ability to accurately model the thermal radiation heat transfer in gaseous media is important for characterizing the energy transfer in atmospheres of the Earth and other planets, astrophysics, and combustion systems such as furnaces, kilns, boilers, gas turbines, internal combustion engines, forest and building fires, atmospheric reentry of ...A radiative transfer simulator was developed to compute the synthetic data of all three instruments onboard NASA's Plankton Aerosol, Cloud, ocean Ecosystem (PACE) observatory, and at the top of the atmosphere (TOA). The instrument suite includes the ocean color instrument (OCI), the Hyper-Angular Rainbow Polarimeter 2 (HARP2), and the Spectro-Polarimeter for Planetary Exploration 1 (SPEXone).Radiation and Radiative Transfer In the preceding chapters we treated the physics of nont-adiating fluids; we now extend the analysis to radiating fluids comprising both material and radiation. Radiation adds to the total energy density, momentum density, stress, and energy flux in the fluid. We must therefore define theseThe radiative transfer theory, also called transport theory, is the theory describing the wave propagation through a medium characterized by a random distribution of scatterers. It usually applies to electromagnetic radiation, but it can be generalized to acoustic radiation. The radiative transfer theory is one of the two theories developed to ...The radiative transfer solver is solving the clear-sky radiative transfer equation Eq. (4) , and the trained neural network of the optimized method 2 is providing the necessary fast parameterization of the layer-to-space transmittance.

We present an overview and several important upgrades to the Vector Discrete Ordinate Radiative Transfer (VDISORT) code. VDISORT is a polarized (vector) radiative transfer code that can be applied to a wide range of research problems including the Earth's atmosphere and ocean system. First, a solution is developed to the complex algebraic eigenvalue problem resulting when the b2 component of ...

The radiative transfer equation (RTE) describes particle propagation and interaction with a background medium. It has been widely applied in many fields of science and engineering including astrophysics [50], heat transfer [29], remote sensing [56], and medical imaging [28]. The RTE is a high-dimensional integro-differential kinetic equation.which states the obvious fact that in the absence of internal sources, the upward radiation (and ultimately the radiation field at any optical depth ) is completely determined by the intensity of inward radiation. Indeed, taking into account that. is well known in the radiative transfer theory ( Sobolev 1963 ). A fast and accurate radiative transfer model for aerosol remote sensing. A fast radiative transfer model, FASMAR, for aerosol remote sensing was developed. The accuracy of FASMAR is better than 3% for GEO and LEO satellite observations. FASMAR is valid for all surface and atmospheric conditions.In this work, a discrete unified gas kinetic scheme (DUGKS) is developed for radiative transfer in anisotropic scattering media. The method is an extension of a previous one for isotropic radiation problems [1]. The present scheme is a finite-volume discretization of the anisotropic gray radiation equation, where the anisotropic scattering phase function is approximated by the Legendre ...Radiative transfer equation (RTE) is the governing equation of radiation propagation in participating media, which plays a central role in the analysis of radiative transfer in gases ...The understanding of Earth's climate depends to a large extent on our knowledge of radiative transfer processes in the atmosphere. Short wavelength radiation in the visible range from the sun enters the atmosphere and finds its way to the surface to warm it. Long wavelength radiation in the infrared range is emitted from the surface to find its way to … Read moreIn this paper, discrete ordinates method is used for solving the 2-D radiative transfer equation (RTE). To consider complex 2-D geometries, Cartesian and unstructured grids are used. Geometries with straight edges, inclined and curvilinear boundaries are considered. A participating medium which absorbs and emits radiation is considered. Block off and embedded boundary procedures are used to ...Stochastic mixture radiative transfer. The SRT theory was developed from the classic 3D radiative transfer, as detailed in Ross (1981). 3D radiative transfer equations can be solved for the radiation regime in each location of the 3D scene (Knyazikhin et al., 1998). However, for the remote sensing applications only average over satellite pixel ...The three-dimensional steady state radiative transfer equation was solved using a Modified Finite Volume Method with a cell-vertex formulation. An Exponential spatial differencing scheme was used to efficiently lessen the false scattering. Several test problems are presented to assess the performance and accuracy of the numerical Method.The theory of radiative heat transfer 1,2,3,4,5,6 predicts a divergence of the heat flux exchanged between two bodies kept at constant temperatures as the separation distance \(d\) between them ...

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The LBL model selected in this study is version 12.6 of the line-by-line radiative transfer model (LBLRTM) developed at Atmospheric and Environmental Research Inc. and derived from the Fast Atmospheric Signature Code (Clough et al., 1989, 1981, 1992, 2005). To describe the effects of pressure and Doppler line broadening, the Voigt line shape is ..." Radiative Transfer is the definitive work in the field. It provides workers and students in physics, nuclear physics, astrophysics, and atmospheric studies with the foundation for the analysis of stellar atmospheres, planetary illumination, and sky radiation. Though radiative transfer has been investigated chiefly as a phenomenon of ...The radiative transfer problem should be simplified to obtain the most important physical estimates. However, the main special features of the real problem such as the spectrum of solar radiation and spectral properties of particles have to be taken into account. The main simplifications are: (1) The plane-parallel cloud of particles is ...Radiative transfer describes how radiation is transformed along its path through absorption, emission, and scattering. Radiative transfer codes are a key component of weather and climate models, and they cover a large range of varying complexities. Here we will cover the key concepts needed to understand the effect of …The Community Radiative Transfer Model (CRTM) allows us to make the best use of the billions of dollars spent on earth-observing satellites for operational data assimilation, calibration and validation, and post-processing applications. The CRTM is the critical operational model that enables satellite data assimilation capabilities in multiple ...The LBL model selected in this study is version 12.6 of the line-by-line radiative transfer model (LBLRTM) developed at Atmospheric and Environmental Research Inc. and derived from the Fast Atmospheric Signature Code (Clough et al., 1989, 1981, 1992, 2005). To describe the effects of pressure and Doppler line broadening, the Voigt line shape is ...With that said, the neglect of three-dimensional (3D) radiative transfer effects and the non-collimated nature of artificial light emission stand as large sources of uncertainty for 1D, plane-parallel radiative transfer calculations, and addressing these shortcomings is the focus of ongoing development for this model. Author contributions sectionThis study rewrites the widely used 6S radiative transfer model (RTM) in Fortran 90, to make which easily studied and used. Three surface reflectance models are also incorporated, including the PROSAIL-D canopy reflectance model, the ACRM canopy reflectance model, and the asymptotic radiative transfer (ART) snow reflectance model. The 6S+PROSAIL model is then further analyzed: (1) Sensitivity ... ….

Radiative transfer is the science that calculates the distribution of radiative energy in planetary atmospheres based on their composition. It is a branch of optics, thanks to …The radiative transfer equation shown in the purple box of Fig. 1 is the scalar (ignoring polarization) radiative transfer equation (SRTE). It is derived in a qualitative fashion on the SRTE Heuristic Development page. There is actually a hierarchy of radiative transfer equations (RTEs).Snow is a critically important element in the Earth climate and water systems, strongly altering surface water and energy fluxes via the positive albedo feedback (Qu and Hall 2006; Flanner et al. 2011).The radiative transfer process and albedo of snow in the solar spectrum affect surface radiative balance by changing the absorption of downward …This radiation transfer approach is a powerful tool of analysis and is used extensively in many areas of applied physics. The chapter also discusses the boundary layer flow of an absorbing and emitting gas, and the heat transfer of a radiating fluid in channels. Next chapter. Radiation Transfer and Interaction of Convection with Radiation Heat ...Here, Cuiet al. report radiative heat transfer in few Ångström to 5 nm gap sizes, between a gold-coated probe and a heated planar gold substrate subjected to various surface cleaning procedures ...Physics Informed NeuralNetworks. 1. Introduction. The study of radiative transfer is of vital importance in many fields of science and engineering including astrophysics, climate dynamics, meteorology, nuclear engineering and medical imaging [1]. The fundamental equation describing radiative transfer is a linear partial integro-differential ...RADMC-3D is capable of modeling radiative transfer in molecular and/or atomic lines. Due to the complexity of line radiative transfer, and the huge computational and memory requirements of full-scale non-LTE line transfer, RADMC-3D has various different modes of line transfer. Some modes are very memory efficient, but slower, while others are ...For radiative heat transfer measurements we parallelized and laterally aligned the emitter and receiver devices with respect to one another. To achieve this we made use of a custom-built ...The study of planetary atmospheres is crucial for understanding the origin, evolution, and processes that shape celestial bodies like planets, moons and comets. The interpretation of planetary spectra requires a detailed understanding of radiative transfer (RT) and its application through computational codes. With the advancement of observations, atmospheric modelling, and inference techniques ...Each species (i) is defined by a plausible set of field plant traits (T RTM), the input of a radiative transfer model (RTM) that predicts the associated reflectance factor (R) (a). Several species (9 in this example) are gathered within a regional species pool (b). Some species feature traits with close or similar values (similar species ... Radiative transfer, A generalized form of the radiation transfer equation is presented, which covers both limiting cases of thin and dense atmospheres and allows a continuous transition from low to high densities, controlled by a density dependent parameter. Simulations of the up- and down-welling radiation and its interaction with the most prominent greenhouse ..., Evaluation of three different radiative transfer equation solvers for combined conduction and radiation heat transfer. Yujia Sun, Xiaobing Zhang, John R. Howell. Pages 262-273 View PDF. Article preview. Near-Field Energy Transport., 7 Radiative Transfer. Radiation through empty space is what makes astronomy possible, but it isn’t so interesting to study on its own. Radiative transfer, the effect on radiation of …, Particularly, with no non-radiative heat transfer, the cooler should have a needle-like spectral emissivity if the objective is to have as low steady-state temperature as possible, and can induce ..., In the study of heat transfer, Schwarzschild's equation [1] [2] [3] is used to calculate radiative transfer ( energy transfer via electromagnetic radiation) through a medium in local thermodynamic equilibrium that both absorbs and emits radiation. The incremental change in spectral intensity, [4] ( dIλ, [W/sr/m 2 /μm]) at a given wavelength ..., In the study of heat transfer, Schwarzschild's equation [1] [2] [3] is used to calculate radiative transfer ( energy transfer via electromagnetic radiation) through a medium in local thermodynamic equilibrium that both absorbs and emits radiation. The incremental change in spectral intensity, [4] ( dIλ, [W/sr/m 2 /μm]) at a given wavelength ..., This study applies the Advanced Radiative Transfer Modeling System (ARMS), which was developed to accelerate the uses of Fengyun satellite data in weather, climate, and environmental applications in China, to characterize the biases of seven infrared (IR) bands of the Advanced Geosynchronous Radiation Imager (AGRI) onboard …, Radiative transfer modeling (RTM) is a widely used technique for understanding and predicting the interactions between electromagnetic radiation and matter in various applications, including agriculture. One of the most used RTM models in vegetation remote sensing is the PROSPECT model, which simulates leaf optical properties and has been used ..., The radiative transfer equation is a monochromatic equation to calculate radiance in a single layer of the Earth's atmosphere. To calculate the radiance for a spectral region with a finite width (e.g., to estimate the Earth's energy budget or simulate an instrument response), one has to integrate this over a band of frequencies (or wavelengths)., "Radiative Transfer is the definitive work in the field. It provides workers and students in physics, nuclear physics, astrophysics, and atmospheric studies with the foundation for the analysis of stellar atmospheres, planetary illumination, and sky radiation. , Aug 20, 2021 · Importance of Radiative Transfer. Radiation has a very prominent role in astrophysics, both as the only observable and also as a dominant mechanism for energy transfer within and out of astrophysical systems. Consequently, its transport through a medium is one of the most fundamental processes that needs to be considered. , 120 An Atmospheric Radiative Transfer Primer FIGURE 6.3 Plane-parallel coordinates. Atmospheric light paths are defined by µ the cosine of the zenith angle. The position of radiative quantities can then be reduced from (x, y, z) to (z). In problems of radiative transfer in plane-parallel atmospheres it is convenient to, which states the obvious fact that in the absence of internal sources, the upward radiation (and ultimately the radiation field at any optical depth ) is completely determined by the intensity of inward radiation. Indeed, taking into account that. is well known in the radiative transfer theory ( Sobolev 1963 )., Chandrasekhar’s work in radiative transfer theory began in 1944 and culminated with the publication of his influential treatiseRadiative Transfer in 1950. In this review his major contributions to radiative transfer will be recounted and evaluated. These include his development of the discrete ordinates method, the invariance principles, and his formulation and solution of the transfer ..., The radiative transfer equation (RTE) for the medium with scattering and absorption is solved by three different solutions. The ratio of the absorption and scattering coefficients ..., Transferring photos from your phone to another device or computer is a common task that many of us do on a regular basis. Whether you’re looking to back up your photos, share them with friends and family, or just free up some space on your ..., Abstract. Air mass factors (AMFs) are used in passive trace gas remote sensing for converting slant column densities (SCDs) to vertical column densities (VCDs). AMFs are traditionally computed with 1D radiative transfer models assuming horizontally homogeneous conditions. However, when observations are made with high spatial resolution in a heterogeneous atmosphere or above a heterogeneous ..., Radiative transfer (RT) theory is the physical approach to describe these paths and processes quantitatively. In water, propagation of electromagnetic radiation is heavily hampered by absorption. Fig. 2.1 shows the absorption coefficient of pure water ( Hale and Querry, 1973 , Segelstein, 1981 ) and the related penetration depth specifying the ..., Jun 19, 2017 · The radiative transport equation (RTE) is the standard equation for describing particle propagation in many different research areas such as neutron transport in reactor physics 1 or light ... , The equation of transfer -- Quadrature formulae -- Isotropic scattering -- Principles of invariance -- The H-functions -- Problems with general laws of scattering -- Principles of invariance -- The X- and Y-functions -- Diffuse reflection and transmission -- Rayleigh scattering and scattering by planetary atmospheres -- The radiative ..., Radiative transfer theory verified by controlled laboratory experiments Michael I. Mishchenko,1,* Dennis H. Goldstein,2 Jacek Chowdhary,3 and Arthur Lompado2 1NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies, 2880 Broadway, New York, New York 10025, USA 2Polaris Sensor Technologies, 200 West Court Sq., Huntsville, Alabama 35801, USA 3Department of Applied Physics and Applied Mathematics, Columbia ..., Yet, in all environmental prediction models and in most satellite remote sensing techniques, radiative transfer is computed assuming clouds and their radiative boundary conditions to be plane‐parallel (i.e., horizontally homogeneous out to infinity), hence simplified to 1-D (the vertical) radiative transfer. This makes radiative transfer ..., Atmospheric RTMs Article Count: 6. Atmospheric radiative transfer models simulate the radiative transfer interactions of light scattering and absorption through the atmosphere. These models are typically used for the atmospheric correction of airborne/satellite data and allow retrieving atmospheric composition. Implemented atmospheric RTMs:, Transferring pictures from your iPhone to your PC can be a daunting task, especially if you’re not tech savvy. Fortunately, there are several easy ways to do this. In this comprehensive guide, we will cover the three most popular methods of..., The discrete ordinates method is employed to find the single-layer solution for vector thermal radiative transfer; this is an extension of the approach for scalar radiative transfer, with the I- and Q-components being dealt with in a parallel way by using a doubled dimension in the discrete ordinate space. Chandrasekhar’s invariance principle ..., Radiative transfer is the study of how light interacts with gases and particles in our atmosphere. Remote sensing is the study of how to use this interaction, or lack thereof, to extract information about the state of the atmosphere or the surface interacting with it. Incoming shortwave radiation from the sun can be absorbed or scattered in the ... , Radiative Transfer George B. Rybicki Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, 60 Garden Street, Cambridge, MA 02138. U.S.A. Abstract. Chandrasekhar's work in radiative transfer theory began in 1944 and culminated with the publication of his influential treatise Radiative Transfer in 1950. In this review his major contributions to, A fast and accurate radiative transfer model for aerosol remote sensing. A fast radiative transfer model, FASMAR, for aerosol remote sensing was developed. The accuracy of FASMAR is better than 3% for GEO and LEO satellite observations. FASMAR is valid for all surface and atmospheric conditions., 10 ⋅ Solution of the Equation of Radiative Transfer Figure 10.1 shows the geometry for a plane-parallel slab. Note that there are inward (µ<0) and outward (µ>0) directed streams of radiation. The boundary conditions necessary for the solution are specified at τν = 0, and τν = τ0. Since the equation of transfer is a first order linear equation, only one, A fast and accurate radiative transfer model for aerosol remote sensing. A fast radiative transfer model, FASMAR, for aerosol remote sensing was developed. The accuracy of FASMAR is better than 3% for GEO and LEO satellite observations. FASMAR is valid for all surface and atmospheric conditions., Radiative transfer is the theory describing how electromagnetic radiation is created, transmitted, absorbed, and scattered in a medium such as a planetary atmosphere, stellar photosphere, or interstellar medium. The medium can emit, absorb, and scatter radiation with a behavior that could vary strongly with wavelength according to the different ..., Radiative Transfer George B. Rybicki Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, 60 Garden Street, Cambridge, MA 02138. U.S.A. Abstract. Chandrasekhar's work in radiative transfer theory began in 1944 and culminated with the publication of his influential treatise Radiative Transfer in 1950. In this review his major contributions to, The radiative transfer equation can be expressed as two decoupled differential equations These two equations are more useful in practical relativistic radiative transfer calculations because they allow the efficient computation, through a simple Eulerian method, of the optical depth along a ray, regardless of whether the ray-tracing is executed ...