This invention is an effective gain medium that overcompensates for the loss of a conventional passive metamaterial, meanwhile keeping its original negative-index property. This material can be used to solve the critical challenge current metamaterial technology faces in practical applications.
Background: Using energy conservation-based theory, full-wave simulation and experimental measurement, the inventors have shown that a fabricated sample consisting of conventional sub-wavelength building blocks with embedded microwave tunnel diodes exhibits a band-limited Lorentzian dispersion simultaneously with a negative refractive index and a net gain.
Applications:
Advantages:
Status: issued U.S. patent #10,431,897