Diffraction of Electromagnetic Waves by a Plane Wire Grating*

Abstract

Previous work on diffraction by a wire grating is briefly reviewed. The problem of diffraction by a finite grating consisting of perfectly conducting wires of arbitrary cross section is formulated in terms of characteristic plane waves corresponding to the various order spectra defined in optics. Scattering matrix elements are expressed as stationary functionals of current distribution on the grating wires, for the incident wave falling at right angles to the grating elements and polarized either parallel or perpendicular to them. These are evaluated for the thin wire grating and parallel polarization.