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Finding the polarization of plane-waves
Posted 10.05.2022, 11:34 GMT-4 Wave Optics Version 5.6 0 Replies
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Hi COMSOL community,
I hope you can help me answer a question that I haven't seen mentioned in COMSOL's documentation.
In the wave-optics module, using the Port boundary condition (type: periodic) to excite plane waves, COMSOL takes as inputs (under port mode settings) the azimuth- and elevation angle for the incoming plane wave and a vector for the electric mode field amplitude. How does COMSOL find the polarization of the input plane wave from these settings?
For example, say I want to simulate a plane wave propagating in vacuum, e.g. a domain consisting of a single block with the input port at the bottom so that the normal-vector is parallel to z, floquet-periodic boundaries on the sides, and an absorbing boundary on top. Let the electric mode field amplitude be parallel to the x axis, i.e. E0 = (1,0,0). For a general azimuth- and elevation angle, E0 is not perpendicular to the k-vector of the plane wave. However, the simulation output should have an electric field that is perpendicular to k to obey Maxwell's equations. So how does COMSOL calculate the direction of the simulated e-field starting from E0 and the angles?
Best regards, Anders
Hello Anders Simonsen
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