Simulation and Analysis of a Metamaterial Sensor Based on a Microring Resonator

Abstract

Metamaterials are artificial media structured on a size scale smaller than the wavelength of external stimuli, that may provide novel tools to significantly enhance the sensitivity and resolution of the sensors. In this paper, we derive the dispersion relation of hollow cylindrical dielectric waveguide, and compute the resonant frequencies and Q factors of the corresponding Whispering-Gallery-Modes (WGM). A metamaterial sensor based on microring resonator operating in WGM is proposed, and the resonance intensity spectrum curves in the frequency range from 185 to 212 THz were studied under different sensing conditions. Full-wave simulations, considering the frequency shift sensitivity influenced by the change of core media permittivity, the thickness and permittivity of the adsorbed substance, prove that the sensitivity of the metamaterial sensor is more than 7 times that of the traditional microring resonator sensor, and the metamaterial layer loaded in the inner side of the microring doesn’t affect the high Q performance of the microring resonator.

Metamaterial Sensors

“…It exposes a strong evanescent field to the surrounding, and thus this region will be quite sensitive in dielectric environment. Besides, SWGM can also be generated on the inner surface of a hollow dielectric waveguide and the surface of a circular or elliptical dielectric cylinder when coated with a metamaterial layer [22][23][24].…”

“…Chen et al [17] reviewed metamaterials application in sensing with an emphasis on split ring resonator-based sensors. Our group has been dedicated to the study of metamaterial sensors for a long time, and a great portion of works have been done [15,[18][19][20][21][22][23][24][25][26][27][28][29]. Zheludev [30] analyzed the future development of metamaterials and pointed out that sensing application represents a growing area.…”

Electromagnetic Reciprocal Cloak with Only Axial Material Parameter Spatially Variant

“…In the past decade, a fascinating term "metamaterials" has attracted a great deal of attentions since it provides many possibilities to explore unknown physical phenomena and fabricate novel devices [1][2][3][4][5][6] such as perfect lens, sensors, and antennae. Recently, theory of transformation optics generalized by Pendry et al and Leonhardt [7,8] built up a bridge between the function of metamaterials and material parameter distribution and provided a complete prescription for controlling and guiding electromagnetic wave as well [9][10][11][12][13][14][15][16][17].…”

“…It indicates that the object enclosed inside the reciprocal cloak can receive information from the outside without distortion, while its presence cannot be detected. It is worth noting that arbitrary object with isotropic or anisotropic material parameters can be cloaked as long as the complementary media layer is "custom-made" according to (4), and the performance of the cloak is independent on the direction of the incident wave and the excitation source. For example, in Figures 4(a) and 4(b), we demonstrate the cloaking of the object with anisotropic permeability μ ro = −1, μ ϕo = 2.…”

Angle- and Polarization-Insensitive Metamaterial Absorber using Via Array

“…Compared with conventional absorbing materials such as ferrite12 or composite materials13, high absorptivity can be achieved by fabricating metamaterials on low-cost printed circuit boards (PCBs), and an almost perfect absorptivity can be achieved in spite of their thin configuration. However, because metamaterials are based on resonator arrays, their absorptivity is dependent on the frequency and its bandwidth is narrow14. Although its narrow bandwidth is useful for sensor applications15, a wide bandwidth is preferred for most applications.…”