ABSTRACT
This chapter focuses on the consideration of the scattering of electromagnetic radiation by large objects compared to the wavelength. It begins with a scatterer, consisting of a perfectly conducting screen, with a (macroscopic) hole in it. The predictions of geometrical optics are altered because of the finite wavelength of the radiation. This phenomenon is called diffraction. A general expression for the diffracted electric field is derived in terms of its boundary values. Although it is an exact expression, the expression is applied to three examples of near forward scattering. The chapter discusses image charge induced by a point charge adjacent to a perfectly conducting plane, geometry of diffraction by a circular aperture, and considers an example of diffraction, in which the aperture is a slit running along the entire z-axis. It also discusses diffraction by a straight edge, and magnitude of the electric field resulting from diffraction by a straight edge.
