Photonic metamaterial

A material patterned with structures smaller than the wavelength of light, so its collective response produces optical properties unavailable in ordinary materials.

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Effective medium theory: A framework that approximates a structured material as a homogeneous medium with averaged properties. It explains when subwavelength structures can be described by effective optical parameters.
Superlens: A lens designed to recover subwavelength image details beyond the conventional diffraction limit. Negative-index behavior can amplify evanescent waves needed for sub-diffraction imaging.
Veselago medium: A medium in which electric permittivity and magnetic permeability are both negative over a frequency range. Veselago’s analysis established the unusual wave behavior later targeted by metamaterial designers.
Refractive index: A measure of how light’s phase velocity in a medium compares with its speed in vacuum. Metamaterials extend the possible effective values and signs of this familiar optical quantity.
Metasurface: A thin, patterned layer that controls light through subwavelength elements arranged across a surface. It is the two-dimensional form of metamaterial design, shaping light at an interface.
Optical cloaking: The redirection of light around an object to reduce its optical visibility. Metamaterial structures can guide light along paths designed to conceal an object.
Victor Veselago: A Soviet physicist who analyzed electromagnetic waves in media with negative permittivity and permeability. His 1968 paper described the foundational properties of negative-index media.
Anisotropic material: A material whose physical properties vary with direction. Natural anisotropy arises from composition or crystal structure, while metamaterial anisotropy can be designed geometrically.
Plasmonics: The study of electromagnetic waves coupled to collective electron oscillations in conducting materials. Metallic metamaterials often use plasmonic resonances to obtain strong optical responses.
Flat optics: Optical systems that use thin, planar components to control light instead of bulky curved elements. Metasurfaces can replace conventional lenses with compact wavefront-shaping layers.