Abstract
Abstract We propose a radio frequency (RF) and visibly transparent composite metasurface design comprising newly developed transparent multilayer conductive coatings. Detailed experimental and theoretical analysis of the RF/visible transparency of the proposed meta-glass is provided. The proposed nature-inspired symmetrical honeycomb-shaped meta-glass design, alters the electromagnetic properties of the glass substrate in the RF spectrum by utilizing visibly transparent Ag-based conductive coatings on each side. Furthermore, the competing effect of the Ag thickness on optical and RF transparency is discussed. We show that using multilayer dielectric-metal coatings, specifically 5-layered spectrally selective coatings, RF transparency of the meta-glass can be enhanced while preserving visible transparency. Herein we demonstrate high transparency meta-glass with 83% and 78% peak RF and optical transmission at 28 GHz and 550 nm, respectively. The meta-glass yields enhanced RF transmission by 80% and 10% when compared to low-emissivity glass and bare glass, respectively. The meta-glass design presented here is amenable to a variety of 5G applications including automobile radar systems. This work provides a superior alternative to the standard indium-tin-oxide (ITO) transparent material which is becoming scarce. Moreover, this study paves the way for the design of new visibly transparent metamaterials and artificial dielectrics.
Highlights
Recent years have witnessed a growing interest in thin metallic nano-films that can simultaneously offer high electrical conductivity and optical transparency, owing to their promising potential in realizing various optically transparent electromagnetic (EM) devices and low-emissivity materials
We propose a radio frequency (RF) and visibly transparent composite metasurface design comprising newly developed transparent multilayer conductive coatings
We present the design of a metamaterial structure comprising identical metasurfaces on both faces of a glass substrate with the objective of enhancing the RF transparency of this composite metamaterial, that is, the metaglass structure, at 28 GHz
Summary
Recent years have witnessed a growing interest in thin metallic nano-films that can simultaneously offer high electrical conductivity and optical transparency, owing to their promising potential in realizing various optically transparent electromagnetic (EM) devices and low-emissivity materials. There has been a focus on the design and fabrication of visibly transparent low-emissive radio frequency (RF) absorbers for IR, acoustic and RF bistealth applications [18,19,20,21,22], where researchers exploit the low conductivity of thin films (e.g., ITO) for high RF absorption Despite their successful integration in a multitude of device constructs, the limited electrical conductivity offered by these material systems along with their scarcity (e.g., ITO) prevents the realization of transparent EM devices that can operate in the high radio frequency (RF) range (GHz–THz). These 5G communication technologies which are based on microwave frequencies
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