Negative-index media are typically made by introducing simultaneous negative permittivity and negative permeability to a system. Now, Simon Yves and co-workers in France claim to have demonstrated a negative-index metamaterial medium that they say is based on just negative effective permittivity and unit cells of resonator pairs supporting a dipolar resonance. The experiments were conducted in the microwave regime at ~4.7 GHz wavelength using quarter-wavelength (16 mm tall) resonators, formed from 1-mm-diameter metal rods, on a ground plane. The team investigated two different approaches: either displacing the position of one of the resonators in a pair, or detuning one resonator. A multiple-scattering-induced dipolar resonance was demonstrated, revealing a negative-effective-index region. The medium was shown to be able to support ‘superlensing’ of point sources of light; the approach may offer relatively low-loss subwavelength imaging as it is not, in principle, necessary to use metals. It is important to note that although the structure is periodic and resembles a photonic crystal, the array period is on a much smaller spatial scale.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Pile, D.F.P. New negative index. Nat. Photonics 13, 303 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41566-019-0431-5
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41566-019-0431-5