Open AccessMicrofluid-based soft metasurface for tunable optical activity in THz wave
Author(s) -
Zhongke Wu,
Bingzhi Zhang,
Xiaohui Fang,
Kejun Cheng,
Weiqian Chen,
Zihuang Wang,
Haoran Dou,
Meng Zhang
Publication year - 2021
Publication title -
optics express
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.394
H-Index - 271
ISSN - 1094-4087
DOI - 10.1364/oe.420660
Subject(s) - materials science , optics , terahertz radiation , polarization (electrochemistry) , polydimethylsiloxane , planar , circular polarization , optoelectronics , microchannel , chirality (physics) , optical tweezers , nanotechnology , physics , chemistry , computer graphics (images) , computer science , microstrip , chiral symmetry breaking , quantum mechanics , quark , nambu–jona lasinio model
Metasurfaces are usually planar structures and do not possess intrinsic chirality and therefore hardly generate optical activity. Here we realized a tunable optical activity in a terahertz wave through a microfluid-based soft metasurface. The meta-atom is a chiral structured microchannel made of soft polydimethylsiloxane and injected with the liquid metal Galinstan. A microfluid pressure system is bonded to the metasurface to reconfigure all meta-atoms simultaneously. By pumping glycerol liquid into the pressure system, the metasurface is deformed from a planar structure to a three dimensional one, which manifests intrinsic chirality for optical activity realization. By controlling the injected glycerol volume, a polarization rotation from 0°to 14° at 0.19 THz is demonstrated. The soft metasurface with tunable optical activity can be flexibly applied in various applications such as polarization microscopy, bio-detection and material analysis, etc.