2023/08/28 by Willie J. Padilla, Padilla, Willie J., Yang Deng +5
Engineering · Materials Science · Physics and Astronomy · #Advanced Antenna and Metasurface Technologies #Electromagnetic Scattering and Analysis #FOS: Physical sciences #Metamaterials and Metasurfaces Applications #Optics (physics.optics)
paper · pdf · doi:10.48550/arxiv.2308.14839
openalex publication_date 2023/08/28 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/28
Past work has considered the analytic properties of the reflection coefficient for a metal-backed slab. The primary result established a fundamental relationship for the minimal layer thickness to bandwidth ratio achievable for an absorber. There has yet to be establishment of a similar relationship for non metal-backed layers, and here we present the universal result based on the Kramers-Kronig relations. Our theory is validated with transfer matrix calculations of homogeneous materials, and full-wave numerical simulations of electromagnetic metamaterials. Our results place more general fundamental limits on absorbers and thus will be important for both fundamental and applied studies.