Abstract
A stretchable metamaterial absorber is proposed in this study. The stretchability was achieved by liquid metal and polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS). To inject liquid metal, microfluidic channels were fabricated using PDMS powers and microfluidic-channel frames, which were built using a three-dimensional printer. A top conductive pattern and ground plane were designed after considering the easy injection of liquid metal. The proposed metamaterial absorber comprises three layers of PDMS substrate. The top layer is for the top conductive pattern, and the bottom layer is for the meandered ground plane. Flat PDMS layers were inserted between the top and bottom PDMS layers. The measured absorptivity of the fabricated absorber was 97.8% at 18.5 GHz, and the absorption frequency increased from 18.5 to 18.65 GHz as the absorber was stretched from its original length (5.2 cm) to 6.4 cm.
Highlights
Since the first theoretical study of metamaterials by Veselago et al in 1968, metamaterials have received substantial attention because of their extraordinary characteristics such as the cloaking capacity and negative indices of refraction [1]
The permeability and permittivity of metamaterials can be manipulated by using conductive patterns
A metamaterial absorber uses an array of unit cells, typically consisting of a top pattern and a bottom ground plane
Summary
Since the first theoretical study of metamaterials by Veselago et al in 1968, metamaterials have received substantial attention because of their extraordinary characteristics such as the cloaking capacity and negative indices of refraction [1]. The permeability and permittivity of metamaterials can be manipulated by using conductive patterns. Metamaterials have been studied for use in various applications such as antennas [2], sensors [3], and perfect absorbers [4,5,6,7,8,9,10,11,12,13,14,15,16]. A metamaterial absorber uses an array of unit cells, typically consisting of a top pattern and a bottom ground plane. The unit cell of the metamaterial absorber can be regarded as an electric LC (ELC) resonator. The reflection of the absorber can be eliminated by matching the impedance of the metamaterial to that of air
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