Terahertz Airy beam generated by Pancharatnam-Berry phases in guided wave-driven metasurfaces

Abstract

Metasurface antennas scatter traveling guided waves into spatial waves, which act as extendable subsources to overcome the size limitation on emission sources. With the use of a Pancharatnam–Berry phase metasurface stimulated by a circularly polarized wave in a waveguide, the local phase distributions of scattered spatial waves can be made consistent with those of an Airy beam, thereby allowing the generation of high-quality Airy beams. In a slab waveguide, circularly polarized waves are synthesized through superposition of in-plane transverse electric modes. Simulations demonstrate that a 20 mm × 20 mm footprint all-dielectric guided wave-driven metasurface generates a 2D Airy beam at a frequency of 0.6 THz. Furthermore, we employ a metasurface deposited on a strip waveguide to generate a 1D Airy beam under direct stimulation by the fundamental transverse electric mode. Our work not only provides a large-scale emitter, but it also suggests promising potential applications in on-chip imaging and holography.