POLARIZATION AND RESONANT ABSORPTION IN INTERSECTING CYLINDERS AND SPHERES

The polarization of a pair of merging spheres and merging cylinders of any complex dielectric constant immersed in an external electric fiel d has been solved. Any degree of intersection, including touching, is covered by the result. The method for cylinders is based on the soluti on of Laplace's equation with boundary conditions on the conjugate sur faces in a modified bicylindrical frame. The result is presented as an integral over a continuum of eigenstates. For merging spherical parti cles solving the boundary problem requires a Miller-Fok integral trans formation. Imaginary parts of polarizabilities were calculated for alu minum cylinders and spheres to assess the spectral absorption response of small merging particles. The relative spacing has a significant in fluence on optical response.