Abstract

We address the general issue of resolving the wave vector in complex electromagnetic media including negative refractive media. This requires us to make a physical choice of the sign of a square root imposed merely by conditions of causality. By considering the analytic behavior of the wave vector in the complex plane, it is shown that there are a total of eight physically distinct cases in the four quadrants of two Riemann sheets.

© 2005 Optical Society of America

Negative index of refraction in optical metamaterials

Vladimir M. Shalaev, Wenshan Cai, Uday K. Chettiar, Hsiao-Kuan Yuan, Andrey K. Sarychev, Vladimir P. Drachev, and Alexander V. Kildishev
Opt. Lett. 30(24) 3356-3358 (2005)

Structure for localizing electromagnetic waves with a left-handed-medium slab and a conducting plane

Qiang Cheng and Tie Jun Cui
Opt. Lett. 30(10) 1216-1218 (2005)

On resolving the refractive index and the wave vector

Johannes Skaar
Opt. Lett. 31(22) 3372-3374 (2006)

Is there an experimental verification of a negative index of refraction yet?

N. Garcia and M. Nieto-Vesperinas
Opt. Lett. 27(11) 885-887 (2002)

Resolving the wave vector and the refractive index from the coefficient of reflectance

V. U. Nazarov and Y.-C. Chang
Opt. Lett. 32(20) 2939-2941 (2007)