Electromagnetic wave scattering from conducting self-affine surfaces : An analytic and numerical study

Abstract

We derive an analytical expression for the scattering of a scalar wave from a perfectly conducting self-affine one dimensional surface in the framework of the Kirchhoff approximation. We show that most of the results can be recovered via a scaling analysis. We identify the typical slope taken over one wavelength as the relevant parameter controlling the scattering process. We compare our predictions with direct numerical simulations performed on surfaces of varying roughness parameters and confirm the broad range of applicability of our description up to very large roughness. Finally we check that a non zero electrical resistivity provided small does not invalidate our results.