Thermally Reconfigurable Meta-Optics

• Published in: IEEE photonics journal Vol. 11; no. 2; pp. 1 - 16
• Main Authors: Lewi, Tomer, Butakov, Nikita A., Evans, Hayden A., Knight, Mark W., Iyer, Prasad P., Higgs, David, Chorsi, Hamid, Trastoy, Juan, Granda, Javier Del Valle, Valmianski, Ilya, Urban, Christian, Kalcheim, Yoav, Wang, Paul Y., Hon, Philip W.C., Schuller, Ivan K., Schuller, Jon A.
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Piscataway IEEE 01.08.2019; The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, Inc. (IEEE)
• Subjects: Amplitudes; Beam steering; Dielectric resonator antennas; Germanium; Holograms; Holography; Infrared spectra; nanoparticles; nanophotonics; nanostructured materials; optical metamaterials; Optical resonators; phase change materials; Phase modulation; Phase transitions; Plasma temperature; Reconfiguration; Resonators; semiconductor materials; Silicon; Temperature dependence; Temperature effects; thermooptical devices; Tuning
• ISSN: 1943-0655; 1943-0655; 1943-0647
• DOI: 10.1109/JPHOT.2019.2916161

Metasurfaces are two-dimensional nanostructures that allow unprecedented control of light through engineering the amplitude, phase, and polarization across meta-atom resonators. Adding tunability to metasurface components would boost their potential and unlock a vast array of new application possibilities such as dynamic beam steering, tunable metalenses, and reconfigurable meta-holograms, to name a few. We present here high-index meta-atoms, resonators, and metasurfaces reconfigured by thermal effects, across the near to mid-infrared spectral ranges. We study thermal tunability in group IV and group IV-VI semiconductors, as well as in phase-transition materials, and demonstrate large dynamic resonance frequency shifts accompanied by significant amplitude and phase modulation in metasurfaces and resonators. We highlight the importance of high-Q resonances along with peak performance of thermal and thermo-optic effects, for efficient and practical reconfigurable devices. This paper paves the way to efficient high-Q reconfigurable and active infrared metadevices.