Proceedings of the 13th INDIACom; INDIACom-2019; IEEE Conference ID: 46181
2019 6 International Conference on “Computing for Sustainable Global Development”, 13th - 15th March, 2019
th
Bharati Vidyapeeth's Institute of Computer Applications and Management (BVICAM), New Delhi (INDIA)
Comparative Analysis of Plasmonic Metamaterial
Absorber for Noble, Alkaline Earth and Transition
Metals in Visible Region
Swapandeep Kaur
Chitkara University Institute of Engineering and
Technology, Chitkara University
Punjab, INDIA
Email Id: swapandeep.kaur@chitkara.edu.in
Abstract – High Absorption efficiency is necessary for
applications like solar cells and photodetectors. Perfect plasmonic
resonance absorbers are of immense interest for the researchers
as they provide greater benefits such as small size, better
flexibility and greater efficacy as compared to standard absorbers.
In this paper, comparative analysis has been performed on the
basis of radiation properties that is absorptivity, reflectivity and
transmittivity for noble, alkaline and transition metals for the
entire visible spectrum. Metamaterial absorber with gold as the
top metal proves to be the best absorber with highest absorptivity
of 0.963, reflectivity of 0.037 followed by silver (absorptivity =
0.883 and reflectivity = 0.117) and copper (absorptivity = 0.852
and reflectivity = 0.148) at a wavelength of 1317. 88nm. Maximum
absorptivity in gold is observed because of its distinct optical
properties that lead to strong localized electric and magnetic
dipole resonances. Transmittivity drops to the minimum value in
the range of 700-1500 nm which meets the requirement for
designing of a good absorber.
Keywords – Absorptivity, Metamaterial, Plasmonic resonance
absorvber, Reflectivity, Transmittivity.
I. INTRODUCTION
Electromagnetic wave absorbers are drawing notable interest
because of their significance in scientific and industrial
applications [1]. Electromagnetic wave absorbers have
characteristics which can be controlled structurally in an
effective manner. They can be divided into two categories,
namely broadband absorbers and resonant absorbers.
Broadband absorbers are further divided into geometric
transition absorbers consisting of two- dimensional periodic
pyramids, in which dielectric constant changes gradually from
free-space to absorber and low-density absorbers having pores
in which many reflections lead to significant absorption [1].
Resonance absorbers are of three kinds, namely Salisbury
screen, Jaumann absorber and Circuit analog absorber. The
Salisbury screen makes use of non-periodic resistive sheet in
front of a ground plate and Jaumann absorber deploys two
purely resistive sheets. The Circuit analog absorber shown in
Fig. 1 uses periodic surface of lossy material having three
layers and form the basis of metamaterials that are artificial
structural elements arranged together.
Copy Right © INDIACom-2019; ISSN 0973-7529; ISBN 978-93-80544-32-8
Harsimran Jit Kaur
Chitkara University Institute of Engineering and
Technology, Chitkara University
Punjab, INDIA
Email Id: harsimran.kaur@chitkara.edu.in
Metamaterials exhibit negative permittivity and negative
permeability [2]. Metamaterial absorber (MMA), an artificial
plasmonic nanostructure proposed first by Landy et. al. can
achieve resonant absorption close to unity by changing electric
permittivity and magnetic permeability for perfect impedance
matching [4]. Due to perfect absorption MMAs have gained
huge interest of researchers and many investigations have
been done to produce devices for invisibility cloaking at
microwave and terahertz frequency [5].
Fig. 1. Diagram of Circuit Analog absorber “d” is the quarter wavelength
gap
Single band MMAs designed for cross circular loop resonator
have a single absorption peak and are limited by narrow band
property whereas multiband MMAs designed for the resonator
have two or more absorption peaks. They were designed in a
lateral manner in which different sized units are stacked into
one unit or in a vertical stacked multilayer structure [4].
Further, Wang et. al. studied a metamaterial absorber of six
bands comprising of metal–dielectric layers above a metal
plane. Six resonance peaks with a good outcome of 99.37%
were obtained. Furthermore, absorption efficiency of 99% was
obtained for the complete visible spectra for angles upto 70 o
from the normal using a new technique involving energy
efficient and environment friendly silk mediated layer [7].
Also, an absorber was designed with thickness of MgF2 being
60 nm, absorption frequency at 424.5 hertz nearly one and full
width at half maximum (FWHM) being 13nm. Wavelength
sensitivity of 190 was achieved [8]. Furthermore, Tharwat et.
al. investigated characteristics of a metamaterial perfect
absorber(MPA) which consisted of metal-dielectric-metal
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 Proceedings of the 13th INDIACom; INDIACom-2019; IEEE Conference ID: 46181
2019 6 International Conference on “Computing for Sustainable Global Development”, 13th - 15th March, 2019
th
stack along with gold hexagonal annular nano-array as a top
layer for even better absorption. An absorption efficiency of
97.5% with 4.5% of ripple in the visible region was obtained.
Further, a design with ultrathin, wide angle, sub-wavelength
high performance metamaterial absorber was proposed for
optical frequencies with an absorption peak of 88% at
wavelength of 1.58 micrometer [5]. In another design, a tandem
grating solar absorber was proposed and analysed using finite
difference time domain (FDTD) simulation with absorbance of
90% in the solar spectrum [10]. In another study, an ideal
absorber composed of nanocomposites having depth in nm and
broad absorption were analysed and found to be insensitive to
incident angle [11]. Moreover, a grating coupled- hyberbolic
metamaterials (GC-HMM) which behaves as a perfect absorber
and high flexibility was designed using FDTD and matlab
simulations [12].Besides these, a metamaterial absorber having
two band and comprising of gold was designed to achieve
perfect absorption at two peak wavelengths [13].
Recently, there have been various studies presenting
metamaterial absorbers at microwave and terahertz frequency.
Most of these proposed structures focuses on studying the
absorption efficiency with aim to design ultrathin wide-angled
subwavelength high performance metamaterial absorbers.It
becomes extremely desirable to design and analyse one-
dimensional perfect metamaterial absorber in visible and near-
IR region for different metallic films viz. gold, silver and
copper. In this paper, perfect optical absorber based on
plasmonic metamaterial has been designed by changing the top
metal of the absorber. Paper presents comparative analysis
with respect to spectral absorptivity, reflectivity and
transmittivity for the noble (Silver (Ag), Gold (Au), Copper
(Cu)) , Alkaline earth (aluminium (Al) , beryllium (Be)) and
transition metals (Chromium (Cr), Nickel (Ni), Palladium
(Pd), Platinum (Pt), Titanuim (Ti), Tungsten (W)).
II. SYSTEM DESIGN
Metamaterial absorber are made up of three layers: the top
metal layer, the middle dielectric and the bottom metal layer.
The top layer comprises of periodic micropatches [1]. The
absorption wavelength depends on the size of the micropatches.
The metal thickness in the top layer and bottom layer needs to
be more than two times the operating wavelength range. The
middle layer thickness decides the field Plasmon coupling
strength and hence the absorption strength. As the thickness
increases, coupling strength increases reaching to the maximum
and thereby decreasing later. Fig. 2 shows schematic diagram
of a metamaterial absorber designed and analysed in this paper.
Wm is the width of the top metal and is equal to 100nm,
periodicity of the structure, P = 400nm, thickness of the top
metal, Tm = 30nm , thickness of the dielectric, td = 35nm and
thickness of bottom metal, tb = 200nm. Refractive index of
background medium is 1 and of the middle layer is 2.5.
Wavelength range chosen for the simulation is 400-1500 nm
and number of wavelengths are 200. Error tolerance chosen is
10-6 and resolution is 5 nm.
Copy Right © INDIACom-2019; ISSN 0973-7529; ISBN 978-93-80544-32-8
We perform the simulation of metamaterial absorber using
FDTD simulation package MEEP (MIT Electromagnetic
Equation Propagation). We are simulating the metamaterial
absorber by changing the top metal .
Fig. 2. Schematic Illustration of a Metamaterial Absorber
III. RESULTS AND DISCUSSION
A light wave in visible spectra (400-1500 nm) is incident
normally on the top metal. This wavelength range is chosen as
optical communication takes place in this range. The unit cell
of simulated metamaterial absorber has Wm = 100 nm, tm = 30
nm, td = 35 nm and tb = 200 nm . With the incidence of visible
light on unit cell, absoptivity, transmittivity and reflectivity
are obtained with the simulated environment for different top
metals (Au, Ag, Cu, Cr, Ni, Al, Be, W, Ti, Pd, Pt) .
Fig.3 presents the dependency of Absorptivity for simulated
unit cell. One can observe that different metals have different
resonant absorption wavelength. Maximum absorptivity of
0.963 is obtained for gold at a wavelength of 1317.88 nm
followed by silver (absorptivity = 0.911 at wavelength =
1302.07nm) and copper (absorptivity = 0 .910 at wavelength =
1286.64nm).
The absorption occurs due to excitation of localized magnetic
and electrical dipoles resonances. This leads to trapping of
light and providing time for its dissipation as ohmic losses in
metals [5]. Absorptivity is a measure of fraction of incident
radiation which is absorbed. Radiation is absorbed by
electrons in the upper 10-6 to 10-5 cm of the surface as
indicated by the radiation coefficient. The metamaterials are
characterized by complex permittivity €(w)= € 1+ i €2 and
permeabilty µ(w)= µ1+i µ2, where €1 and €2 are real and
complex part of permittivity and µ1 and µ2 are the real and
complex part of permeability respectively. € 2 and µ2 can be
varied for creation of a good absorber [3]. Both the electric
and magnetic fields can be absorbed by change of permittivity
and permeability.
Gold metal has unique optical properties leading to excitation
of strong localized electric and magnetic dipole resonances
[5]. Thus, the absorptivity of the present metamaterial
absorber is maximum when gold metal is selected for top layer
due to strong electric dipole resonances.
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 Comparative Analysis of Plasmonic Metamaterial Absorber for Noble, Alkaline Earth and Transition Metals in Visible Region

Fig. 5. Transmittivity vs Wavelength

Fig. 3. Variation of Absorptivity with respect to wavelength Table 1. shows Transmittivity, Reflectivity and Absorptivity
obtained for the simulated plasmonic metamaterial absorber
Fig. 4 represents the variation of reflectivity with respect to the by changing top layer. It can be concluded that gold behaves
wavelength. The lowest reflectivity of 0.0371 is obtained for as the best absorber with high absorptivity of 0.963 and low
gold at a wavelength of 1317.9 nm. The reflectance spectra reflectivity and transmittivity of 0.037 and 1.02e-07
displays peak at the wavelengths where localized surface respectively followed by silver (absorptivity = 0.883) and
Plasmon resonance occurs. This is because of the constructive copper (absorptivity = 0.852).Subsequently, palladium has an
interference caused by superposition of reflected waves when absorptivity of 0.728,followed by nickel (absorptivity = .582)
light is incident from the lower refractive medium. In contrast and platinum (absorptivity = 0.560). Beryllium has
to this, when light is incident from higher refractive index absorptivity of 0.414 , chromium has value of 0.390 and
medium, destructive interference results in a valley at tungsten has a value of 0.382. Titanium has absorptivity of
wavelengths close to localized surface Plasmon resonance 0.359 and least absorptivity is of aluminium with value of
wavelength. 0.281. Strong absorption in gold is due to localized magnetic
To behave as a perfect absorber, absorptivity should be and electric dipole resonances that give sufficient time to
maximum whereas transmittivity and reflectivity must be utilize light energy by ohmic losses in metals [1] Further study
minimum. When light is incident normally at the surface, the can be done by changing the bottom layer of the absorber and
transmittivity of all the elements show a peak at 501.68 nm. analysing the radiation properties for noble, alkaline earth and
However ,transmittivity values drop for all the elements for the transition metals
longer wavelength range that is in the range of nearly 700-1500
nm as obtained in Fig. 5. This is because, there is huge TABLE I. RADIATION PROPERTIES FOR THE PLASMONIC
impedance mismatch in the air and the metal for the longer METAMATERIAL ABSORBER AT WAVELENGTH OF 1317.88NM
wavelengths . Element Transmittivity Reflectivity Absorptivity
Gold 1.02x10-7 0.037 0.963
silver 1.50x10-7 0.117 0.883
aluminium 1.19x10-7 0.719 0.281
berilyuim 6.2x10-7 0.586 0.414
chromium 4.14x10-7 0.609 0.390
copper 1.55x10-7 0.148 0.852
nickel 3.29x10-8 0.418 0.582
Palladium 4.2x10-8 0.271 0.728
Platinum 4.62x10-8 0.439 0.560
Titanium 3.88x10-8 0.641 0.359
Tungsten 6.68x10-8 0.618 0.382

IV. CONCLUSION AND FUTURE SCOPE

Fig. 4. Reflectivity vs Wavelength
In this paper, we simulated metamaterial absorbers with three
layers that is metal-dielectric-metal structure for the visible
spectrum with aim of changing top metal to Au, Ag, Cu, Cr, Ni,
Al, Be ,W, Ti, Pd, Pt . Results are compared for the absorptivity ,
reflectivity and transmittivity between eleven metals to determine
a perfect metamaterial absorber . High absorption of 96.3% and
low reflectivity of 3.71% was obtained for the gold metal at a

Copy Right © INDIACom-2019; ISSN 0973-7529; ISBN 978-93-80544-32-8 266

 Proceedings of the 13th INDIACom; INDIACom-2019; IEEE Conference ID: 46181
2019 6 International Conference on “Computing for Sustainable Global Development”, 13th - 15th March, 2019
th

wavelength of 1317.88 nm followed by silver (absorptivity =

0.911 and reflectivity = 0.088 at 1302.07nm) and copper
(absorptivity = 0.910 and reflectivity = .089 at 1286.64 nm)
Subsequently, the absorptivities of rest of the metals are in the
order Pd, Ni, Pt, Be, Cr, W, Ti and Al. The future work could
include simulations carried out by changing the bottom layer to
obtain the response of absorptivity, reflectivity and transmittivity.
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