Loss compensation in metal-dielectric structures in negative-refraction and super-resolving regimes

We study the influence of gain on negative refraction and super-resolution in transparent resonant metal-dielectric photonic band gap structures in the visible and near infrared ranges. We find that while the introduction of gain can compensate for losses caused by the excitation of surface waves, it also improves the resolving characteristics of the lens and leads to gain-tunable super-resolution.