Perfect Reflection of Light by an Oscillating Dipole

TL;DR

This paper demonstrates theoretically that a single oscillating dipole can perfectly reflect a directional light wave, with up to 85% reflection of focused plane waves, impacting quantum emitter-photon interactions.

Contribution

It introduces a theoretical model showing perfect reflection of light by a single dipole and quantifies high reflection efficiency for focused beams.

Findings

Perfect reflection of a directional dipole wave by a single point-like dipole.

Up to 85% of incident light reflected by a strongly focused plane wave.

Results applicable across the full electromagnetic spectrum, enabling strong photon-emitter coupling.

Abstract

We show theoretically that a directional dipole wave can be perfectly reflected by a single point-like oscillating dipole. Furthermore, we find that in the case of a strongly focused plane wave up to 85 % of the incident light can be reflected by the dipole. Our results hold for the full spectrum of the electromagnetic interactions and have immediate implications for achieving strong coupling between a single propagating photon and a single quantum emitter.