Theory of near field optics

The optical imaging of micro- and nanometric objects requires the detection of non-radiative field components confined at the vicinity of their surface. Since 1984, numerous experimental applications of this concept in Near Field Optics (NFO) have been demonstrated and a broad variety of Scanning Near Field Optical Microscopes (SNOM) have been elaborated and continuously improved. In order to guide the ongoing development of this new subwavelength optical probing method, as well as to refine the understanding of the contrast mechanisms involved in NFO, several theoretical frameworks have already been proposed and considerable modelling work has been performed. The present paper will be devoted to a detailed analysis of the NFO image formation mechanisms of three-dimensional (3D) objects. In order to circumvent the obstacles inherent to the matching of the electromagnetic boundary conditions on the surface of complex objects, this analysis will be presented in the framework of the Integral Equation Formalism (IEF). Two original numerical schemes, both based on a different discretization procedure, will be discussed; and several numerical applications on systems of experimental interest will be presented. Particularly, the problem of near field distributions around 3D-objects of various sizes and shapes will be discussed as a function of experimental parameters.

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