Absorption of electromagnetic waves in a magnetized medium

In continuation to our earlier work, in which the structure of the polarization tensor in a medium was analyzed in the presence of a background electromagnetic field, we discuss the absorptive part of the polarization tensor. Using the real time formalism of finite temperature field theory we calculate the absorptive part of the I-loop polarization tensor in the weak field limit (eB<m(2)). Estimates of the absorption probability are also made for different physical conditions of the background medium.