Diffraction grating theory with RCWA or the C method

Diffraction gratings are often used in optical metrology. When an electromagnetic wave is incident on a grating, the periodicity of the grating causes a multiplicity of diffraction orders. In many metrology applications one needs to know the diffraction efficiency of these orders. Since the period of a grating is often of the same order of magnitude as the wavelength, it is needed to solve Maxwell’s equations rigorously in order to obtain these diffraction efficiencies. Two of those methods are the rigorous coupled-wave analysis (RCWA) and the C method. In this paper a comparison is made between RCWA and the C method with respect to accuracy and speed. Restrictions are made to one-interface problems, which means that only two media are involved separated by one interface, and only gratings are considered with a periodicity in only one direction.