This article presents a method for extracting the optical constants of homogeneous isotropic materials using the infrared spectra of that material. The method is based on using the harmonic oscillator model of molecular polarizability to obtain optical constants, then calculating the spectrum, comparing the calculated spectrum to an experimental spectrum of the material, and adjusting the model parameters until a close fit between the spectra is obtained. Corrections that need to be made to the experimental spectra in order to remove instrumental distortions are also briefly described. The remainder of the article centers on describing how the optical constants can be used to simulate spectra of that material in different experimental arrangements and the benefits that spectral simulations afford to experimentalists.
Keywords: Spectral simulations; infrared spectrometry; optical constants; vibrational spectra.