Transformation thermodynamics, as one of the important branches among the extensions of transformation optics, has attracted plentiful attentions and interests recently. The result of transformation thermodynamics, or called as “thermal cloak”, can realize isothermal region and hide objects from heat. In this paper, we presented the concept of “reverse thermal cloak” to correspond to the thermal cloak and made a simple engineering definition to identify them. By full-wave simulations, we verified that the reverse thermal cloak can concentrate heat and realize local heating. The performance of local heating depends on the anisotropic dispersion of the cloaking layer's thermal conductivity. Three-dimensional finite element simulations demonstrated that the reverse thermal cloak can be used to heat up objects. Besides pre-engineered metamaterials, such reverse thermal cloak can even be realized with homogenous materials by alternating spoke-like structure or Hashin coated-sphere structure.

We present the generation of arbitrary order Bessel beams at 0.3 THz through the implementation of suitably designed axicons based on 3D printing technology. The helical axicons, which possess thickness gradients in both radial and azimuthal directions, can convert the incident Gaussian beam into a high-order Bessel beam with spiral phase structure. The evolution of the generated Bessel beams are characterized experimentally with a three-dimensional field scanner. Moreover, the topological charges carried by the high-order Bessel beams are determined by the fork-like interferograms. This 3D-printing-based Bessel beam generation technique is useful not only for THz imaging systems with zero-order Bessel beams but also for future orbital-angular-momentum-based THz free-space communication with higher-order Bessel beams.

We present a method to design and fabricate a kind of converters based on flexible metasurfaces which can change the polarization state of an incident terahertz beam. The metasurface consists of a two-dimensional array of rectangular metallic antennas that can abruptly change the phase of the incoming terahertz beam. Experimentally demonstrated half-wave plates generate 0.1 THz beam with a π/2 polarization rotation. By slightly changing the structure of the converter, an elliptically or circularly polarized beam is expected to be obtained. These flexible terahertz converters may have many potential applications in terahertz technology.