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Manipulate light polarizations with metamaterials: From microwave to visible

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An Erratum to this article was published on 22 September 2010

Abstract

Polarization is an important characteristic of electromagnetic (EM) waves, and efficient manipulations over EM wave polarizations are always desirable in practical applications. Here, we review the recent efforts in controlling light polarizations with metamaterials, at frequencies ranged from microwave to visible. We first presented a 4 × 4 version transfer matrix method (TMM) to study the scatterings by an anisotropic metamaterial of EM waves with arbitrary propagating directions and polarizations. With the 4 × 4 TMM, we discovered several amazing polarization manipulation phenomena based on the reflection geometry and proposed corresponding model metamaterial systems to realize such effects. Metamaterial samples were fabricated with the help of finite-difference-time-domain (FDTD) simulations, and experiments were performed to successfully realize these ideas at both microwave and visible frequencies. Efforts in employing metamaterials to manipulate light polarizations based on the transmission geometry are also reviewed.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Surface Physics Laboratory (State Key Laboratory) and Physics Department, Fudan University, Shanghai, 200433, China

    Jia-ming Hao  (郝加明) & Lei Zhou  (周磊)

  2. Laboratory of Photonics and Microwave Engineering, School of Information and Communication Technology, Royal Institute of Technology (KTH), Electrum 229, 164 40, Kista, Sweden

    Jia-ming Hao  (郝加明) & Min Qiu  (仇旻)

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  1. Jia-ming Hao  (郝加明)
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  2. Min Qiu  (仇旻)
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  3. Lei Zhou  (周磊)
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Correspondence to Lei Zhou  (周磊).

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An erratum to this article can be found at http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s11467-010-0146-z

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Hao, Jm., Qiu, M. & Zhou, L. Manipulate light polarizations with metamaterials: From microwave to visible. Front. Phys. China 5, 291–307 (2010). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11467-010-0005-y

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