Indian Institute of Science Education and Research, Kolkata 15th December 2010

“Dynamic Properties of Reflection and

Refraction of EM waves at a Plane Interface
between Dielectrics”
Harsh Purwar (07MS – 76)
Student, Electrodynamics – III (PH – 412)
Indian Institute of Science Education and Research, Kolkata

The reflection and refraction of light at a plane surface between two media of different dielectric
properties are familiar phenomena. The various aspects of the phenomena divide themselves into two
broad classes:

 Kinematic Properties
1. Angle of reflection ( ) equals angle of incidence ( ):

2. Snell’s law:

where and corresponds to the indices of refraction of the medium in which light is
incident and the medium in which it emerges after refraction respectively.
 Dynamic Properties
1. Intensities of the refracted and reflected radiations.
2. Phases changes and polarization.

The kinematic properties follow immediately from the wave nature of the phenomena and from the fact
that there are boundary conditions to be satisfied. But they do not depend on the detailed nature of the
waves or the boundary conditions. On the other hand, the dynamic properties depend entirely on the
specific nature of electromagnetic fields and their boundary conditions.

Figure 1: Incident wave ⃗ strikes plane interface between different media, giving rise to a reflected wave ⃗ and a
refracted wave ⃗ .

1 | Report on ‘Reflection and Refraction of EM Waves at Plane Interface between Dielectrics’ by Harsh Purwar
Indian Institute of Science Education and Research, Kolkata 15th December 2010

The coordinate system and symbols appropriate to the problem are shown in Figure 1. The media below
and above the plane have permeabilities and permittivities , and , respectively. A plane wave
with wave vector ⃗ and frequency is incident from medium , . The refracted and reflected waves have
wave vectors ⃗⃗⃗ and ⃗⃗⃗⃗ respectively, and ̂ is a unit normal directed from medium , to , .

Incident:

√
Refracted:

√
Reflected:

√
Note: The wave numbers have the magnitudes,
|⃗ | |⃗ | √
|⃗ | √
The dynamic properties are contained in the following boundary conditions:

 Normal component of ⃗ is continuous.

 Normal component of ⃗ is continuous.
 Tangential component of ⃗ is continuous.
 Tangential component of ⃗ is continuous.

Mathematically these BC’s are,

{ ⃗ ⃗ ⃗ } ̂ ( )
{⃗ ⃗ ⃗ ⃗ ⃗ ⃗ } ̂ ( )
{⃗ ⃗ ⃗ } ̂ ( )
⃗ ⃗ ⃗ ⃗ ⃗ ⃗
{ } ̂ ( )

Now before applying these boundary condition it is convenient to consider two separate situations, one in
which the incident plane wave is plane polarized with its polarization vector perpendicular to the plane of
incidence and the other in which polarization vector is parallel to the plane of incidence. The general case
of arbitrary elliptic polarization can be obtained by appropriate linear combinations of the two results.
Let us first consider the case where the electric field is perpendicular to the plane of incidence as shown in
Figure 2. The orientations of the vectors are chosen to give a positive flow of energy in the direction of
the wave vectors. Since all the electric fields are parallel to the surface or perpendicular to ̂, equation ( )
yields nothing. From ( ) and ( ) we have,
( )
And,
| ⃗ || ⃗ | | ⃗ || ⃗ | | ⃗ || ⃗ |
( ) ( ) ( )

2 | Report on ‘Reflection and Refraction of EM Waves at Plane Interface between Dielectrics’ by Harsh Purwar
Indian Institute of Science Education and Research, Kolkata 15th December 2010

√ ( ) √ ( )

Figure 2: Refraction and reflection with polarization perpendicular to the plane of incidence.

Now equations ( ) and ( ) can be solved to get the relative amplitudes of the refracted and reflected
waves, which are,
( )
√

√
( )
√
Note: The above equations are also valid for complex dielectric constants.

Now if the electric field is parallel to the plane of incidence as shown in Figure 3, from the equations ( )
and ( ) we have,

Figure 3: Refraction and reflection with polarization parallel to the plane of incidence.

3 | Report on ‘Reflection and Refraction of EM Waves at Plane Interface between Dielectrics’ by Harsh Purwar
Indian Institute of Science Education and Research, Kolkata 15th December 2010

( )
And,

√ ( ) √ ( )

Again the relative amplitudes of the reflected and the refracted fields can be computed from above two
boundary conditions to give,
( )
√

√
( )
√
Now for normal incidence ( ) and taking , we have for both the cases,

This means that if there is a phase reversal for the reflected wave.

Works Cited
1. Jackson, J. D. Classical Electrodynamics. s.l. : John Wiley & Sons, 1998. 047130932X.

4 | Report on ‘Reflection and Refraction of EM Waves at Plane Interface between Dielectrics’ by Harsh Purwar