Determination of surface profile statistics from electromagnetic scattering data

A new reverse Monte Carlo method for the determination of the surface profile statistics from differential reflection data for the scattering of electromagnetic radiation from rough surfaces is presented. The method is used to extract the power spectrum of the surface profile from scattering data recently measured by West and O'Donnell [J. Opt. Soc. Am. A 12, 390 (1995)]. Excellent agreement with the power spectrum of the surface profile measured by contact profilometry is obtained.