FUNDAMENTALS AND APPLICATIONS OF METAMATERIALS AND RELATED STRUCTURES

超材料是一个新兴的领域，它为发现新的物理现象和在几个应用学科中利用这些现象提供了巨大的机会。电磁超材料尤其是具有不寻常电磁特性的人工结构化介质，例如负折射率。通常，它们包括一组亚波长的金属介电包裹体，可以使用介电常数和磁导率张量在宏观上进行均质。围绕超材料的科学兴奋可以通过问这个问题来结晶：如果我们能够用用户定义的电磁参数合成材料，那会是什么可能？在这份提案中，我们描述了一项解决这一基本问题的某些方面的计划，长期目标是将相应的材料用于几种突破性的微波和光学应用。主要重点将放在微波制度上，但一些活动也将致力于光学制度。还将考虑受超材料启发的相关结构(在某种意义上，它们可以执行超材料的一些功能，但不能严格地用有效的材料张量来描述)。这些超材料及其相关结构的预期应用领域包括亚波长成像和传感(例如用于医疗/生物应用)、用于无线电信的紧凑和多功能天线、超分辨率雷达和传感器、高效无线能量传输(例如用于为未来的汽车充电)、医疗治疗(例如用于高温)、国防、射频/光学仪器和高速数字互连。

Metamaterials is an emerging field which offers great opportunities for discovering new physical phenomena and for exploiting them in several application disciplines. Electromagnetic metamaterials in particular are artificially structured media with unusual electromagnetic properties, such as a negative index of refraction. Typically, they comprise an arrangement of sub-wavelength metallo-dielectric inclusions which can be macroscopically homogenized using permittivity and permeability tensors. The scientific excitement surrounding metamaterials can be crystallized by asking the question: What would be possible if we were able to synthesize materials with user-defined electromagnetic parameters? In this proposal, we are describing a program to tackle some aspects of this fundamental question with a long term aim at utilizing the corresponding materials for several groundbreaking microwave and optical applications. The main emphasis will be placed to the microwave regime but some activities will be devoted to the optical regime as well. Related structures that are inspired by metamaterials (in the sense that they can perform some of the functions of metamaterials but cannot be strictly described by effective material tensors) will also be considered. Envisioned application areas of these metamaterials and their related structures include sub-wavelength imaging and sensing (e.g. for medical/biological applications), compact and multifunctional antennas for wireless telecommunications, super-resolution radars and sensors, efficient wireless power transfer (e.g. for 'charging' up the cars of the future), medical therapeutics (e.g. for hyperthermia), defense, RF/optical instrumentation and high-speed digital interconnects.