Heinz Artur Raether (14 October 1909 — 31 December 1986) was a German physicist. He is best known for his theoretical and experimental contributions to the study of surface plasmons, as well as for Kretschmann-Raether configuration, a commonly-used experimental setup for the excitation of surface plasmon resonances. From 1944 to 1946 he was a professor of physics at the University of Jena at the Physikalisches Institut. Here he dealt with electron physics, electron microscopy, electron interference and gas discharges.