Physical and analytical properties of a stabilized electric field integral equation

The physical and analytical properties of a stabilized form of the electric field integral equation are discussed for closed and open perfectly conducting geometries. It is demonstrated that the modified equation provides a well-conditioned formulation for smooth geometries in both the high- and low-frequency limits; an instability remains near the edges of open geometries, requiring future consideration. The surface Helmholtz decomposition is used to illustrate the mechanism of the stabilization procedure, and the relevance of this mechanism to the numerical discretization of the equation is outlined.