Metamaterials (meta means beyond in change the sign of and in the four
Greek) are new artificial materials with Maxwells equations, we get a left-
unusual electromagnetic properties that
are not found in naturally occurring
materials. All natural materials such as
glass, diamond and such have positive
electrical permittivity, magnetic perme-
ability and an index of refraction. In
these new artificially fabricated materi-
alstermed as negative index materials
(NIM) or double negative (DNG) media
or left handed (LH) materials or back-
ward wave (BW) mediaall these mate-
rial parameters are negative. With these
unusual material parameters, new kinds
of miniaturized antennas and microwave
components/devices can be created for
the wireless
communica-
tions and the
d e f e n s e
A brief intro
industries.
In optics, every lens made has been
limited by the wavelength of the light it
uses to focus until now. With metama-
terials, a super lens that can focus on
features smaller than the wavelength of
the light itself should be possible. This
possibility opens up sub-wavelength
magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) for
medical applications such as increased
resolution to observe tiny cancerous
cells. MRI systems employ coils to inter-
cept the radio frequency (RF) magnetic
flux from regions of interest deep with-
in the body. Using metamaterials offers
novel possibilities of guiding RF flux to
the receiver coil, permitting a clear
image to be obtained where none
might be detectable otherwise.
Properties
The electrical permittivity (response to
an electric field) and the magnetic per-
meability (response to a magnetic
field) are the main determinants of a
materials response to electromagnetic
(EM) waves. In metamaterials, both
these material parameters are negative.
Correspondingly, the refractive index of
the metamaterials is also negative since
the refractive index n = -. Hence,
light bends the wrong way when it
enters from a vacuum to the metamate-
rials as illustrated in Fig. 1. Usually,
ARTVILLE COMPOSITE: MKC
light bends toward the normal (normal
to the interface as shown by the dotted
line in Fig. 1) when it enters from a
rarer medium to a denser medium. But
for metamaterials, light bends away
from the normal.
An immediate outcome of negative
and in metamaterials is that when we
44
Background on construction
Russian physicist, Victor Veselago,
handed triplet of electric field E, mag-
netic field H and phase vector k. For
normal materials, it is a right-handed
triplet. This implies the phase vector k
and the group velocity or Poynting vec-
tor S are in the
opposite
direc-
tion
to metamaterials
Rakhesh
S.
Kshetrimayum for metamaterials.
Thereby, the
waves flow in a so-called backwards
fashion (i.e. the wave phase appears to
undulate backwards while the energy
propagates along the incident in a for-
ward direction). The direction of the
phase velocity is specified by the phase
vector k; whereas, the direction of
propagation of the energy or the group
velocity is indicated by the Poynting
vector S.
Another strange property of metama-
terials is the reverse Doppler effect. It
makes a train-whistle sound higher in
pitch as it approaches and lower in
pitch as it recedes. The possible appli-
cation for such phenomenon is in
mobile wireless communication and is
still under investigation.
Also, there is the reverse Cerenkov
effect. This means a charged particle
passing through a medium emits light
from a cone behind the particle rather
than in front of it as in normal materi-
als. Cerenkov radiation occurs when a
charged particle moves in a material
with a speed faster than light. In particle
physics, one possible application is con-
structing a Cerenkov detector to identify
charged particles of various velocities.
0278-6648/04/$20.00 2004 IEEE
theoretically proposed Metamaterials in
1968. He had theoretically investigated
the electrodynamics of substances with
simultaneously negative values of
dielectric constant () and magnetic
permeability (). He had investigated
how the electromagnetic (EM) waves
would propagate in such materi-
als and what would be their
properties. However, exper-
imental verifications of
such materials with the
simultaneously negative
and did not occur
until recently. In 1996,
John B. Pendry et al
proposed that a peri-
odic array of copper
wires with a specific
radius and spacing
produces an electro-
magnetic response of
negative materials.
Three years later, he fur-
ther proposed that a period-
ic array of split ring resonators
(SRRs) would have a frequency
band where is negative.
Now, let us consider how these
metamaterials are created. The simplest
way is to construct a periodic structure
composed of pairs of elements, in
which one element array produces a
negative and the other element array
produces a negative . Thus, David
Smith et al envisaged that if they could
somehow combine these two Pendry
proposed artificial materials, the com-
posite would be a metamaterial with
both negative and , just as Veselago
hypothesized over 30 years ago. So
they started constructing such compos-
ite artificial materials and observed their
material properties.
The first metamaterial was fabricated
by interleaving SRRs and copper wires.
The experiment used a 2-D array of
repeated unit cells of copper strips and
split ring resonators (SRR) on interlock-
ing strips of standard circuit board
materials. The scattering angle mea-
sured from the transmitted beam
through a prism fabricated from these
metamaterial structures showed a fre-
quency band with the index of refrac-
tion negative. In such metamaterials, an
array of SRRs contributes to the nega-
tive ; the copper wire array con-
tributes to the negative and the com-
bined array results in a negative perme-
ability and permittivity material. David
IEEE POTENTIALS
Smith and his colleagues at UCSD
reported the outcome in the 2001 April
issue of Science.
In July 2003, Richard W. Ziolkowski
from the University of Arizona reported
another metamaterial. This metamaterial
comprised of a substrate with embed-
ded capacitively loaded strips (CLSs)
and square split ring resonators (SRRs).
CLSs produce a strong dielectric-like
response thereby contributing to the
negative and the square SRRs give a
strong magnetic material-like response
that contributes to the negative . The
combined composite structure of CLSs
array and square SRRs array exhibits a
frequency band where both the effec-
tive , are negative and, consequent-
ly, have a negative index of refraction.
It has been reported that metamateri-
als can be designed, fabricated and test-
ed with normal microwave engineering
tools. These available fabrication tech-
niques like clean room etching, shadow
mask/etching, etc could be applied in
many frequency bands. But right now
the attention has been focused on the
Radio Frequency (RF) to 100 GHz fre-
quency range. This is because fabrica-
tion becomes more difficult and more
costly as the wavelength involved gets
shorter at the higher frequency.
Super lens
The first possible applications of such
artificially composed metamaterials are
in optics due to their negative refractive
index. John B. Pendry, a physicist at the
Imperial College London, has claimed
that lens made of metamaterials could
focus light for objects less than wave-
length in size to a geometric point.
All lens utilizing natural materials
known today cannot focus light onto an
area smaller than the square wave-
length of the light used to examine it
(the diffraction limit). For instance,
atoms are smaller than the wavelength
of visible light. Hence, they cannot be
seen using optical microscopes. The EM
field emanating from a line source con-
sists of plane waves. Some of them are
propagating while others are attenuat-
ing. They are called evanescent waves.
A conventional lens can only focus
the propagating waves. This results in
the imperfect image of the object. The
finer spatial details (smaller than a
wavelength) of the object, carried by
the evanescent waves, are lost due to
the strong attenuation these waves
experience when traveling from the
object to the image. This loss of the
DECEMBER 2004/JANUARY 2005
evanescent spectrum constitutes the ori-
gin of diffraction limit. But, metamateri-
als based lens achieve perfect imaging
by supporting as well the growing
evanescent waves which restore, at the
image plane, the decaying evanescent
waves emanating from the source.
Thereby, the lens resolution is greatly
Air
enhanced.
Sub-wavelength resolution, or enters from the vacuum to the metamaterials
focusing beyond the diffraction limit,
is possible with a perfect, flat lens made
up of metamaterials. Thats why such
lens are also referred to as super lens.
George V. Eleftheriades from University
of Toronto reported in the 19 March
2004 issue of Physical Review Letters
that it is possible to achieve /2 resolu-
tion using such kinds of super lens.
Anything smaller than a wavelength of
light such as atoms and molecules are
out of reach for even the best available
optical microscopes. But for such
super lens one could literally see pre-
viously invisible objects like atoms.
Antennas and more
Another possible application is in the
area of communications. It is possible
to construct leaky-wave antennas with
backward to forward scanning capabili-
ty using such metamaterials.
Conventional leaky-wave antennas have
the drawbacks of scanning only the
half-space, i.e. they only have forward
scanning capability. Utilizing metamate-
rials, we also can have the backward
scanning capability. If we combine the
conventional and metamaterials based
leaky-wave antennas, it is possible to
construct backfire-to-end-fire leaky-
wave antennas with the capability of
scanning in all directions.
Beside these examples, many
researchers are trying to improve the
performance of microwave, wireless
communications, microelectronics and
optical devices using these new meta-
materials. For instance, a coupled-line
coupler with arbitrary coupling, a com-
pact enhanced-bandwidth hybrid ring, a
dual-band inharmonic coupler, with the
enhanced performance, have been pro-
posed by Tatsou Itoh and others at the
University of California, Los Angeles
(UCLA).
Controversy
Every new discovery or invention has
Normal Materials
Metamaterials
Fig. 1 Light bends the wrong way when it
controversy surrounding it.
Metamaterials are no exception.
Prashant Valanju et al at the University
of Texas at Austin claims that negative
refraction would violate the fundamen-
tal speed limit of light. But there have
been quite a few experimental results
Air Metamaterials Air
Fig. 2 Perfect, flat lens focusing light
to a geometric point for objects
smaller than a wavelength
to support negative refraction as men-
tioned previously.
With such mounting evidence,
researchers around the world have
started accepting this new artificial
material with its unusual properties.
Besides, many defense organizations,
companies and research institutes are
sponsoring research projects to explore
such artificial metamaterials: structures,
properties and applications. For
instance, RF metamaterials has been
started in the UK with the work of John
B. Pendry at Imperial College in collab-
oration with Marconi Research. Most
major US defense companies have a
metamaterials program now. Boeing
45
leads a Defense Advanced
Research Projects Agency
(DARPA) consortium
focusing on negative
refraction in the GHz fre-
quency range. There is a
second DARPA consortium
led by UCLA with a more
academic focus. The
European Union (EU) has
funded a consortium
under the Future and
Emerging Technology pro-
gram and many applica-
tions for substantial funds
are in the pipeline. Seeing
what the future holds for
these wonderful new arti-
ficial materials means
looking beyond just their
negativity.
Split Ring Resonator
Read more about it:
V. G. Veselago,
Electrodynamics of substances with
ETA KAPPA NU
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46
Copper Wire
Fig. 3 Photograph of a metamaterial
(courtesy of David Smith, UCSD)
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J. B. Pendry, A. J. Holden, D. J.
Robbins and W. J. Stewart,
Magnetism from conductors and
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http://physics.ucsd.edu/~drs/
left_home.htm
http://www.metamaterials.net/
http://microlab.seas.ucla.edu/
MURI/MURI.html
http://www.foresight.gov.uk/
servlet/Controller/ver=1928/2_2.htm
P. M. Valanju, R. M. Walser and
A. P. Valanju, Wave refraction in
Negative Index Media is always posi-
tive and very inhomogeneous,
Physical Review Letters, vol. 88, no. 18,
187401-1, 6 May 2002
A. K. Iyer and G. V.
Eleftheriades, Negative refractive
index metamaterials supporting 2-D
waves, IEEE International Microwave
Symposium Digest, pp. 1067-1070,
June 2-7, 2002.
C. Caloz and T. Itoh, Novel
microwave devices and structures
based on the transmis-
sion line approach of
meta-materials, IEEE
International
M i c r o w a v e
Symposium Digest, pp.
195-198, June 7-13,
2003.
R. W.
Ziolkowski, Design,
fabrication and testing
of double negative
metamaterials, IEEE
Transactions on
Antennas and
Propagation, vol. 51,
no. 7, pp. 1516-1529,
July 2003.
A. Alu and N.
Engheta, Pairing an
epsilon-negative slab
with a mu-negative
Unit Cell
slab: resonance, tun-
neling and transparen-
cy, IEEE Transactions on Antennas
and Propagation, vol. 51, no. 10, pp.
2558-2571, Oct. 2003.
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Acknowledgement
The author is grateful to his PhD super-
visor Dr. Lei Zhu for introducing to this
wonderful world of metamaterials. The
author is also thankful to his fellow
researchers Huamin Shi, Sheng Sun,
Rong Fu, Hang Wang and Jing Gao for
their useful comments and suggestions
on the topic. Finally, the author is
grateful to the anonymous reviewers
and Potentials editor Mary K. Campbell
for their valuable comments.
About the author
The author is a 3rd year PhD student in
the School of Electrical and Electronic
engineering at the Nanyang Tech-
nological University, Singapore. He
received his Bachelor of Technology
degree in Electrical Engineering with the
first class from the Indian institute of
Technology, Bombay.
After his undergraduate studies at the
IIT-Bombay, he worked as a software
engineer for a year at the MphasiS,
Pune and Banglore. His present
research interests are in metamaterials,
electromagnetic band gap, filters and
periodic structures.
IEEE POTENTIALS