Peculiarities of Surface Plasmons in Quantum Plasmas

Abstract

Surface plasmons (SP) in a semi-bounded quantum plasma with degenerate electrons (e.g., a metal) is considered, and some interesting consequences of electron Pauli blocking for the SP dispersion and temporal attenuation are discussed. In particular, it is demonstrated that a semi-bounded degenerate plasma with a sharp boundary supports two types of SP with distinct frequencies and qualitatively different temporal attenuation, in contrast to a non-degenerate plasma that only supports one type of SP \citep{Guernsey_1969}.