Figure 1

Shows how changing the relative magnitude of total energy E and potential energy V for a Schrodinger wave (right side) produces analogies with different classes of optical problem (left side). Dielectric permittivity is denoted as \({\boldsymbol{\varepsilon }}={\boldsymbol{\varepsilon }}^{\prime} +i{\boldsymbol{\varepsilon }}^{\prime\prime} \).