The scattering and absorption characteristics of material-coated periodic gratings under oblique incidence

A boundary integral formulation is presented for calculating the scattering from material-coated periodic gratings under oblique incidence. Periodic boundary conditions and expansion of the fields in terms of Floquet harmonics allow the boundary integral formulation to treat just a single period of the infinite grating. Numerical results for an etched conducting grating designed for use at infrared wavelengths are presented and shown to be in good agreement with a series of measurements. Results for a number of dielectric gratings for both normal and oblique incidence also agree well with other published data. The conductor-backed coated grating is studied, and it is shown that the groove profile can be used to significantly alter the absorbing characteristics for lossy material coatings