On reflection from a suddenly created plasma half-space: transient solution

The reflection by a suddenly created plasma half-space of a time-harmonic plane electromagnetic wave propagating in free space is considered. The problem involves a temporal discontinuity, a spatial discontinuity, and a dispersive medium. The steady-state solution is obtained by considering the basic features of the scattering processes due to each of the discontinuities in terms of analogous transmission-line models. The electric field of the reflected wave consists of two components. One component (called component A) is of the same frequency as the incident wave frequency and is due to the spatial discontinuity. The other component (called component B) is of a different frequency and arises because of the temporal discontinuity. The B component is damped out even if the plasma is only slightly lossy. The damping rate of the B component is calculated. The transient solution is obtained through the use of Laplace transforms. The solution is given in terms of Bessel-like functions. The limiting value of this solution is shown to agree with the steady-state solution. Numerical results illustrating the transient effects are for two typical cases