Use of information on the manufacture of samples for the optical characterization of multilayers through a global optimization.

We present a procedure for the optical characterization of thin-film stacks from spectrophotometric data. The procedure overcomes the intrinsic limitations arising in the numerical determination of many parameters from reflectance or transmittance spectra measurements. The key point is to use all the information available from the manufacturing process in a single global optimization process. The method is illustrated by a case study of solgel applications.