Near-field chiral excitation of universal spin-momentum locking transport of edge waves in microwave metamaterials

Abstract

Controlling energy flow in waveguides has attractive potential in integrated devices from radio frequencies to optical bands. Due to the spin-orbit coupling, the mirror symmetry will be broken, and the handedness of the near-field source will determine the direction of energy transport. Compared with well-established theories about spin-momentum locking, experimental visualization of unidirectional coupling is usually challenging due to the lack of generic chiral sources and the strict environmental requirement. In this work, we design a broadband near-field chiral source in the microwave band and discuss experimental details to visualize spin-momentum locking in three different metamaterial waveguides, including spoof surface plasmon polaritons, line waves, and valley topological insulators. The similarity of these edge waves relies on the abrupt sign change of intrinsic characteristics of two media across the interface. In addition to the development of experimental technology, the advantages and research status of interface waveguides are summarized, and perspectives on future research are presented to explore an avenue for designing controllable spin-sorting devices in the microwave band.