Diffraction of Electromagnetic Waves by Non-Uniform Metal-Dielectric Sphere in Optical and Microwave Bands

A full wave analytical solution of the problem of EM plane wave diffraction by multilayered metal-dielectric sphere is presented. The proposed solution is based on variable separation method. The high numerical efficiency of the algorithm is achieved due to suggested original recurrence relations for evaluation of the fields within the multilayered sphere. The comparison of the analytical results and results of 3D CAD tool FEKO shows excellent agreement. The extinction cross-sections have been calculated for modern plasmonic materials (TaN, ZrN, HfN, AZO, ITO) in optical band. The proposed solution is used also for analysis of near and far field of antenna systems based on Luneburg lens.