English

Polarization oscillations of near-field thermal emission

Optics 2016-05-25 v1

Abstract

We consider the polarization of thermal emission in the near-field of various materials including dielectrics and metallic systems with resonant surface modes. We find that at thermal equilibrium, the degree of polarization exhibits spatial oscillations with a period of approximately half the optical wavelength, independent of material composition. This result contrasts with that of Setala, Kaivola and Friberg [Phys. Rev. Lett. 88, 123902 (2002)], who find monotonic decay of the degree of polarization for systems in local thermal equilibrium.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.1506.00707,
  title  = {Polarization oscillations of near-field thermal emission},
  author = {Manabu Machida and Evgenii Narimanov and John C. Schotland},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1506.00707},
  year   = {2016}
}

Comments

8 pages, 3 figures