Effective dielectric functions of samples obtained by evaporation of alkali halides

This paper investigates the dielectric properties of inhomogeneous samples consisting of small alkali halide particles (NaCl, KBr) on gold-coated substrates. Our reflection measurements in the far infrared can be simulated as a thin layer of the powder with an effective dielectric function on a perfectly reflecting substrate. Scanning electron micrographs provide useful information about sample topology. Several mixing formulas (e.g. the Maxwell-Garnett, the Bruggeman- and the Looyenga-formula) lead to effective dielectric functions neglecting the individual arrangement of the particles. The essence of our work is that, in contrast, the general ansatz of the Bergman spectral representation has to be employed in order to take into account topology effects on the dielectric function based on the so-called spectral densityg adjustable to the specific situation.