SYNFOS

An expression for the amplitude of a pulse of synchrotron radiation coherently scattered in the forward direction by a Mössbauer absorber consisting of randomly oriented paramagnetic iron-containing molecules (for example, a frozen solution of a ⁵⁷Fe protein) in an applied magnetic field is derived from the theory of γ optics. It is assumed that the hyperfine splittings present in the Mössbauer nuclei can be described in the framework of the spin-Hamiltonian formalism. In the general case of a thick Mössbauer sample of this kind the response on an incident monochromatic and fully polarized beam cannot be given analytically because of the integrations involved. How nuclear forward-scattering for this general case is evaluated in the program package called SYNFOS is outlined.