Microfluid-based soft metasurface for tunable optical activity in THz wave

Metasurfaces are usually planar structures and do not possess intrinsic chirality and therefore hardly generate optical activity. Here we realized a tunable optical activity in a terahertz wave through a microfluid-based soft metasurface. The meta-atom is a chiral structured microchannel made of soft polydimethylsiloxane and injected with the liquid metal Galinstan. A microfluid pressure system is bonded to the metasurface to reconfigure all meta-atoms simultaneously. By pumping glycerol liquid into the pressure system, the metasurface is deformed from a planar structure to a three dimensional one, which manifests intrinsic chirality for optical activity realization. By controlling the injected glycerol volume, a polarization rotation from 0 degrees to 14 degrees at 0.19 THz is demonstrated. The soft metasurface with tunable optical activity can be flexibly applied in various applications such as polarization microscopy, bio-detection and material analysis, etc. (C) 2021 Optical Society of America under the terms of the OSA Open Access Publishing Agreement

Automated summary

In this study, a tunable optical activity in a terahertz wave was achieved through a microfluid-based soft metasurface, demonstrating polarization rotation. The soft metasurface can be flexibly applied in various fields such as polarization microscopy, bio-detection, and material analysis.