The diffraction of light by a U.S. penny and an aperture of the same size with the light source and viewing screen 20 m from the objects has been investigated quantitatively. It was found that the diffraction by these relatively large objects involving such unusually long light paths could be adequately described by the scalar theory of Kirchhoff in the specialized form due to Lommel. Differences noted between the theory and the measurements are discussed, with probable causes indicated.
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P.M. Rinard (1976) studied this question.