Analysis of metal-clad optical waveguide polarizers by the vector beam propagation method

The attenuation characteristics of a metal-clad planar optical waveguide polarizer are computed by a modified finite-difference beam propagation method, taking into consideration the complex refractive indices of the metals used and the vector characteristics of the guided mode. Numerical results for practical optical waveguide refractive-index profiles such as the step and Gaussian distributions are presented. The method should find applications in the design of metal-clad optical waveguide polarizers and other lossy waveguide devices with arbitrary refractive-index profiles and can be easily expanded to three-dimensional cases.