Cyclotron phase resonance in a thin slab: The variational method

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Abstract
The transmission of electromagnetic energy through a thin plasma slab in the anomalous-skin-effect regime is calculated using a new variational principle. The principle is shown to be closely related to the iterative scheme used in the multiple-reflection method. Using this new technique, we show that, for slabs even as thin as 1/10 of an electron mean free path, the higher-order multiple reflections are negligible and the first-order multiple-reflection result provides an excellent approximation to the true transmission. In a succeeding paper, this variational technique will be extended to include Fermi-liquid correlation effects.