Characterization of porous polar semiconductors by their optical spectra in the region of phonon and plasmon-phonon excitations

Optical properties of porous A3B5 semiconductors (GaAs, InP, and GaP) in the far-infrared region, in particular, the specular reflection and attenuated total reflection, including the excitation regime of surface polaritons, are considered. Considering a porous material as a composite, we performed calculations in the context of the effective medium model using two modifications of it, Maxwell-Garnett and Bruggeman, which correspond to two different topologies of the composite material—matrix and statistical. The effect of porosity of the material and of such parameters as doping, anisotropy, and penetration depth of an electromagnetic wave to a porous material on optical spectra is analyzed. In addition, some experimental data are presented and the adequacy of the performed numerical simulation is demonstrated.