The shape of things, illuminated: Metamaterials, surface topology and light-matter interactions

Finding new connections between different disciplines leads to new – and sometimes useful – ideas. That’s exactly what happened when scientists in the Department of Physics, Queens College, City University of New York (CUNY), in collaboration with City College of CUNY, Purdue University and University of Alberta, leveraged mathematical topology to create an artificially nanostructured anisotropic (exhibiting properties with different values when measured along axes in different directions) metamaterial that can be switched from a non-conductive dielectric state to a medium that behaves like metal in one direction and like a dielectric another. The metamaterial’s optical properties was mapped onto a topological transformation of an ellipsoidal surface into an hyperboloid – and transitioning from one to the other dramatically increases the photon density, resulting in dramatic increase in the light intensity inside the material. The researchers state that by allowing topologically-based manipulation of light-matter interactions, these types of metamaterials could lead to a wide range of photonic applications in solar cells, light emitting diodes, displays, and quantum computing and communications.