Localization and Absorption of Light in 2D Composite Metal-Dielectric Films at the Percolation Threshold

TL;DR

This paper investigates how light localizes and how dielectric properties behave in 2D metal-dielectric composite films at the percolation threshold, considering metallic losses and resonant frequencies, using modeling and computational methods.

Contribution

It introduces a comparative analysis of exact and renormalization group methods for modeling light localization and conductivity in composite films at the percolation threshold.

Findings

Localization persists even with vanishing metallic losses.

Renormalization group captures general conductivity behavior but not local fields.

Experimental anomalous absorption aligns with localization results.

Abstract

We study in this paper the localization of light and the dielectric properties of thin metal-dielectric composites at the percolation threshold and around a resonant frequency where the conductivities of the two components are of the same order. In particular, the effect of the loss in metallic components are examined. To this end, such systems are modelized as random $L-C$ networks, and the local field distribution as well as the effective conductivity are determined by using two different methods for comparison: an exact resolution of Kirchoff equations, and a real space renormalization group method. The latter method is found to give the general behavior of the effective conductivity but fails to determine the local field distribution. It is also found that the localization still persists for vanishing losses. This result seems to be in agreement with the anomalous absorption observed experimentally for such systems.