Kramers-Kronig Relations in Optical Materials Research

Book excerpt: TheKramers-Kronigrelationsconstitutethemathematicalformulationofthe fundamental connection between the in-phase to the out-of-phase response of a system to a sinusoidal time-varying external perturbation. Such connection exists in both classical and quantum physical systems and derives directly from the principle of causality. Apart from being of great importance in high energy physics, statistical physics, and acoustics, at present the Kramers-Kronig relations are basic and widely-accepted tools for the investigation of the linear optical properties of materials, since they allow performing the so-called inversion of optical data, i.e. acquiring knowledge on dispersive phenomena by measurements of absorptive phenomena over the whole energy spectrum or vice versa. Since the late ’80s, a growing body of theoretical results as well as of experimental evidences has shown that the Kramers-Kronig relations can be adopted for e?ciently acquiring knowledge on nonlinear optical phenomena. These results suggest that the Kramers-Kronig relations may become in a near future standard techniques in the context of nonlinear spectroscopy. Thisbookisthe?rstcomprehensivetreatisedevotedtoprovidingauni- ing picture of the physical backgrounds, of the rigorous mathematical theory, and of the applications of the Kramers-Kronig relations in both ?elds of l- ear and nonlinear optical spectroscopy. Some basic programs written for the 1 MATLAB environment are also included. This book is organized as an argumentative discourse, progressing from the linear to the nonlinear phenomena, from the general to the speci?c s- tems, and from the theoretical to the experimental results.