Abstract and Applied Analysis
Volume 2004 (2004), Issue 6, Pages 471-486
doi:10.1155/S1085337504306287

Electromagnetic fields in linear and nonlinear chiral media: a time-domain analysis

Ioannis G. Stratis1 and Athanasios N. Yannacopoulos2

1Department of Mathematics, University of Athens, Panepistimiopolis, Zographou, Athens 15784, Greece
2Department of Statistics and Actuarial Science, University of the Aegean, Karlovassi, Samos 83200, Greece

Received 30 September 2002

Copyright © 2004 Ioannis G. Stratis and Athanasios N. Yannacopoulos. This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

Abstract

We present several recent and novel results on the formulation and the analysis of the equations governing the evolution of electromagnetic fields in chiral media in the time domain. In particular, we present results concerning the well-posedness and the solvability of the problem for linear, time-dependent, and nonlocal media, andresults concerning the validity of the local approximation of the nonlocal medium (optical response approximation). The paper concludes with the study of a class of nonlinear chiral media exhibiting Kerr-like nonlinearities, for which the existence of bright and dark solitary waves is shown.