Electric Field Propagation in Isotropic Layered Media

(2 2 Transfer Matrix Formulation)

Benjamin Blonder
November 15, 2006
1 Theory
Consider the boundary conditions imposed on the electric eld, as in Figure 1.
At an interface for s-polarized (TE) wave:
E
1s
+ E

1s
= E
2s
+ E

2s
_

1
(E
1s
E

1s
) cos
1
=
_

2
(E
2s
E

2s
cos
2
These may be written in matrix notation as:
D
s
(1)
_
E
1s
E

1s
_
= D
s
(2)
_
E
2s
E

2s
_
D
s
(i) =
_
1 1
_

i
cos
i

_

i
cos
i
_
, i = 1, 2
Similarly for p-polarized (TM) waves:
(E
1p
+ E

1p
) cos
1
= (E
2p
+ E

2p
) cos
2
_

1
(E
1p
E

1p
) =
_

2
(E
2p
E

2p
Or in matrix notation:
1
z
x
!
1
,
1
!
2
,
2
E

1
E
1
E

2
E
2
"
1
"
2
Figure 1: An arbitrarily polarized electric eld at a dielectric boundary.
D
p
(1)
_
E
1p
E

1p
_
= D
p
(2)
_
E
2p
E

2p
_
D
p
(i) =
_
cos
i
cos
i
_

i
_
, i = 1, 2
We assume further that
_
/ n to simplify calculations. This yields
D
s,l
=
_
1 1
n
l
cos
l
n
l
cos
l
_
D
p,l
=
_
cos
l
cos
l
n
l
n
l
_
We may also dene a matrix accounting for the phase shift of waves propagating to both
the left and right:
2
x
z
n
1
A
1
B
1
x
1
n
2
A
2
B
2
x
2
n
N-1

n
N
A
N
B
N
x
N
n
s
A

s
B

s
n
0
A
0
B
0
x
0

Figure 2: A multilayer dielectric medium.

P
l
=
_
e
i
l
0
0 e
i
l
_
Now consider an an arbitrary multilayer system composed of s dielectric slabs, as depicted
in Figure 2. We write the refractive index as
n(x) =
_

_
n
0
, x < x
0
n
1
, x
0
< x < x
1
.
.
.
.
.
.
n
N
, x
N1
< x < x
N
n
s
, x
N
< x
and the layer thicknesses as
d
1
= x
1
x
0
d
2
= x
2
x
1
.
.
.
d
N
= x
N
x
N1
The electric eld of a general plane-wave solution can be written as
E = E(x)e
i(tkzz)
3
where
E(x) =
_
_
_
A
0
e
ik
0x
(xx
0
)
+ B
0
e
ik
0x
(xx
0
)
, x < x
0
A
l
e
ik
lx
(xx
l
)
+ B
l
e
ik
lx
(xx
l
)
, x
l
1
< x < x
l
A

s
e
iksx(xx
N
)
+ B

s
e
iksx(xx
N
)
, x
N
< x
and
k
lx
=
_
_
n
l

c
_
2
k
2
z
= n
l

c
cos
l
k
z
= n
l

c
sin
l
Thus, we may also write

l
= k
lx
d
l
We also note that
l
in any layer may be found from
0
by Snells Law. The polarization
of these waves must also be specied; any further usage of D will assume this polarization
has been chosen.
At x = x
l
we must impose our continuity conditions. Identifying A
l
and B
l
with the
magnitudes of left- and right-propagating waves, then inverting D, we nd for the rst
boundary,
_
A
0
B
0
_
= D
1
0
D
1
_
A
1
B
1
_
For any other layer, the propagation distance must be taken into account:
_
A
l
B
l
_
= P
l
D
1
l
D
l+1
_
A
l+1
B
l+1
_
, l = 1, 2, . . . , N
where s is represented by N + 1, A
N+1
= A

s
, B
N+1
= B

s
.
Therefore, A
0
and B
0
can be related to A

s
and B

s
by the transfer matrix T such that
_
A
0
B
0
_
=
_
T
11
T
12
T
21
T
22
__
A

s
B

s
_
4
and
T = D
1
0
_
N

l=1
D
l
P
l
D
1
l
_
D
s
We can immediately dene reection and transmission coecients as
r =
_
B
0
A
0
_
B

s
=0
=
T
21
T
11
t =
_
A

s
A
0
_
B

s
=0
=
1
T
11
2 Examples
2.1 Quarter-Wave Stack
Consider light incident on a system consisting of N pairs of alternating quarter-wave layers
such that n
1
d
1
= n
2
d
2
= /4, where n
0
is the index of the incident medium and n
s
is the
index of the substrate. We nd
T = D
1
0
[D
1
P
1
D
1
1
D
2
P
2
D
1
2
]
N
D
s
By construction,
P
l
=
_
i 0
0 i
_
Assuming normal incidence,
D
1
P
1
D
1
1
D
2
P
2
D
1
2
=
_

n
2
n
1
0
0
n
1
n
2
_
This enables us to calculate
R = |r|
2
=
_
1 (n
s
/n
0
)(n
1
/n
2
)
2N
1 + (n
s
/n
0
)(n
1
/n
2
)
2N
_
2
Thus, as N , R approaches unity - a perfect reector.
5
2.2 Homogeneous Thin Film
Consider a single homongenous thin lm with index n
2
and thickness d bounded by media
of indices n
1
and n
3
. We then have
T = D
1
1
D
2
P
2
D
1
2
D
3
Carrying through this multiplication we nd for p polarized light,
R =

cos
2
_
cos
3
cos
1

n
3
n
1
_

i sin
2
_
n
2
cos
3
n
1
cos
2

n
3
cos
2
n
2
cos
1
_
cos
2
_
cos
3
cos
1
+
n
3
n
1
_
+
i sin
2
_
n
2
cos
3
n
1
cos
2
+
n
3
cos
2
n
2
cos
1
_

2
where
=

c
n
2
d cos
2
and the angles
2,3
may be found by Snells Law from
1
.
References
[1] Yeh, Pochi. Optical Waves in Layered Media. John Wiley & Sons, 1988.
[2] Hepburn, Carl. Britney Spears: Transfer Matrix Method of Reectivity. Available from
http://britneyspears.ac/physics/transmtx/transfermtx.htm
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