Broadband wave absorption in single-layered and nonstructured graphene based on far-field interaction effect

We present a wave absorption design consisting of periodical arrays of dielectric bricks on the dielectric substrate, which is coated with single-layered and nonstructured graphene, supported by a thick piece of metal. The design is demonstrated to broadband near-perfect absorption with 0.82 terahertz (THz) bandwidth of over 90% absorption and with central frequency of 1.68 THz. The broadband absorption mechanism originates from two contributions. Firstly, the periodical arrays of dielectric bricks on the nonstructured graphene can provide both a set of graphene plasmon resonances with large relative frequency interval and relative radiation rate gamma/omega in the THz range. Secondly, the linewidth of each resonance can be broadened by the far-field interaction between neighboring resonators to overlap and spread over a wide frequency region in the THz range. The design in this paper is simple, and consequently facilitates the fabrication and promotes the application of broadband graphene absorbers. (C) 2017 Optical Society of America