Metamaterials are artificial structures that can be designed to exhibit specific electromagnetic properties not commonly found in nature. Recently, metamaterials with simultaneously negative permittivity (/spl epsiv/) and permeability (/spl mu/), more commonly referred to as left-handed (LH) materials, have received substantial attention in the scientific and engineering communities. The unique properties of LHMs have allowed novel applications, concepts, and devices to be developed. In this article, the fundamental electromagnetic properties of LHMs and the physical realization of these materials are reviewed based on a general transmission line (TL) approach. The general TL approach provides insight into the physical phenomena of LHMs and provides an efficient design tool for LH applications. LHMs are considered to be a more general model of composite right/left hand (CRLH) structures, which also include right-handed (RH) effects that occur naturally in practical LHMs. Characterization, design, and implementation of one-dimensional and two-dimensional CRLH TLs are examined. In addition, microwave devices based on CRLH TLs and their applications are presented.

Composite right/left-handed transmission line metamaterials

To address the need for fundamental universally valid definitions of exact bandwidth and quality factor (Q) of tuned antennas, as well as the need for efficient accurate approximate formulas for computing this bandwidth and Q, exact and approximate expressions are found for the bandwidth and Q of a general single-feed (one-port) lossy or lossless linear antenna tuned to resonance or antiresonance. The approximate expression derived for the exact bandwidth of a tuned antenna differs from previous approximate expressions in that it is inversely proportional to the magnitude |Z'/sub 0/(/spl omega//sub 0/)| of the frequency derivative of the input impedance and, for not too large a bandwidth, it is nearly equal to the exact bandwidth of the tuned antenna at every frequency /spl omega//sub 0/, that is, throughout antiresonant as well as resonant frequency bands. It is also shown that an appropriately defined exact Q of a tuned lossy or lossless antenna is approximately proportional to |Z'/sub 0/(/spl omega//sub 0/)| and thus this Q is approximately inversely proportional to the bandwidth (for not too large a bandwidth) of a simply tuned antenna at all frequencies. The exact Q of a tuned antenna is defined in terms of average internal energies that emerge naturally from Maxwell's equations applied to the tuned antenna. These internal energies, which are similar but not identical to previously defined quality-factor energies, and the associated Q are proven to increase without bound as the size of an antenna is decreased. Numerical solutions to thin straight-wire and wire-loop lossy and lossless antennas, as well as to a Yagi antenna and a straight-wire antenna embedded in a lossy dispersive dielectric, confirm the accuracy of the approximate expressions and the inverse relationship between the defined bandwidth and the defined Q over frequency ranges that cover several resonant and antiresonant frequency bands.

Impedance, bandwidth, and Q of antennas

A metamaterial paradigm for achieving an efficient, electrically small antenna is introduced Spherical shells of homogenous, isotropic negative permittivity (ENG) material are designed to create electrically small resonant systems for several antennas: an infinitesimal electric dipole, a very short center-fed cylindrical electric dipole, and a very short coaxially-fed electric monopole over an infinite ground plane Analytical and numerical models demonstrate that a properly designed ENG shell provides a distributed inductive element resonantly matched to these highly capacitive electrically small antennas, ie, an ENG shell can be designed to produce an electrically small system with a zero input reactance and an input resistance that is matched to a specified source resistance leading to overall efficiencies approaching unity Losses and dispersion characteristics of the ENG materials are also included in the analytical models Finite element numerical models of the various antenna-ENG shell systems are developed and used to predict their input impedances These electrically small antenna-ENG shell systems with idealized dispersionless ENG material properties are shown to be very efficient and to have fractional bandwidths above the values associated with the Chu limit for the quality factor without any degradation in the radiation patterns of the antennas Introducing dispersion and losses into the analytical models, the resulting bandwidths are shown to be reduced significantly, but remain slightly above (below) the corresponding Chu-based value for an energy-based limiting (Drude) dispersion model of the permittivity of the ENG shell

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Metamaterial-based efficient electrically small antennas

Metamaterials (MTMs), which are formed by embedding inclusions and material components in host media to achieve composite media that may be engineered to have qualitatively new physically realizable response functions that do not occur or may not be easily available in nature, have raised a great deal of interest in recent years. In this paper, we highlight a large variety of the physical effects associated with double- and single-negative MTMs and some of their very interesting potential applications. The potential ability to engineer materials with desired electric and magnetic properties to achieve unusual physical effects offers a great deal of excitement and promise to the scientific and engineering community. While some of the applications we will discuss have already come to fruition, there are many more yet to be explored.

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A positive future for double-negative metamaterials

Planar two-dimensional (2D) and volumetric three-dimensional (3D) metamaterial-inspired efficient electrically-small antennas that are easy to design; are easy and inexpensive to build; and are easy to test; are reported, i.e., the EZ antenna systems. The proposed 2D and 3D electrical- and magnetic-based EZ antennas are shown to be naturally matched to a 50 source, i.e., without the introduction of a matching network. It is demonstrated numerically that these EZ antennas have high radiation efficiencies with very good impedance matching between the source and the antenna and, hence, that they have high overall efficiencies. The reported 2D and 3D EZ antenna designs are linearly scalable to a wide range of frequencies and yet maintain their easy-to-build characteristics. Several versions of the 2D EZ antennas were fabricated and tested. The measurement results confirm the performance predictions. The EZ antennas systems may provide attractive alternatives to existing electrically-small antennas.

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Metamaterial-Inspired Efficient Electrically Small Antennas

The effect of surrounding an electrically small dipole antenna with a shell of double negative (DNG) material (/spl epsiv//sub r/<0 and /spl mu//sub r/<0) has been investigated both analytically and numerically. The problem of an infinitesimal electric dipole embedded in a homogeneous DNG medium is treated; its analytical solution shows that this electrically small antenna acts inductively rather than capacitively as it would in free space. It is then shown that a properly designed dipole-DNG shell combination increases the real power radiated by more than an order of magnitude over the corresponding free space case. The reactance of the antenna is shown to have a corresponding decrease. Analysis of the reactive power within this dipole-DNG shell system indicates that the DNG shell acts as a natural matching network for the dipole. An equivalent circuit model is introduced that confirms this explanation. Several cases are presented to illustrate these results. The difficult problem of interpreting the energy stored in this dipole-DNG shell system when the DNG medium is frequency independent and, hence, of calculating the radiation Q is discussed from several points of view.

Application of double negative materials to increase the power radiated by electrically small antennas

The causality of waves propagating in a double-negative (DNG) metamaterial (epsilon (r) 0 and mu(r)>0), arrive causally before the negative index effects germinate completely Comparisons with approximate analytical results demonstrate the presence of the negative index of refraction properties in the continuous wave portion of the signals This dynamic pulse reshaping between the positive and negative index of refraction wave components causes an apparent delay in the realization of the negative index of refraction properties Pulse broadening of the signal tails is associated with both dispersion and a larger negative index of refraction seen by the associated wave components

Causality and double-negative metamaterials.

Reciprocity between the power scattered by nested metamaterial shells and the power radiated by an antenna centered within those nested shells has been investigated. Resonant scattering caused by an incident, fundamental transverse-magnetic mode was found to be reciprocal to the power resonantly radiated by an electrically small electric dipole for a variety of configurations. These findings indicate that the power radiated by an electrically small antenna and scattered by an electrically small object can be significantly increased through the use of realizable metamaterials.

Reciprocity between the effects of resonant scattering and enhanced radiated power by electrically small antennas in the presence of nested metamaterial shells.

Allison D. Kipple

Papers

Application of double negative materials to increase the power radiated by electrically small antennas

Causality and double-negative metamaterials.

Reciprocity between the effects of resonant scattering and enhanced radiated power by electrically small antennas in the presence of nested metamaterial shells.