Diffracted evanescent wave model for enhanced and suppressed optical transmission through subwavelength hole arrays

Transmission enhancements of order 1000 have been reported for subwavelength hole arrays in metal films and attributed to surface plasmon (SP) resonance. We show that the properly normalized enhancement factor is consistently less than 7, and that similar enhancements occur in nonmetallic systems that do not support SPs. We present a new model in which the transmission is modulated not by coupling to SPs but by interference of diffracted evanescent waves generated by subwavelength features at the surface, leading to transmission suppression as well as enhancement. This mechanism accounts for the salient optical properties of subwavelength apertures surrounded by periodic surface corrugations.