Department News

The Guiding of Light: Metamaterials Provide a New Roadmap to Steer Electromagnetic Waves

Boston College physicists devise a novel method for bending light

August 7, 2009


Chestnut Hill, Mass. (August 7, 2009) – Using a composite metamaterial to deliver a complex set of instructions to a beam of light, Boston College physicists have created a device that guides electromagnetic waves around objects such as the corner of a building or the profile of the Eastern seaboard.

Boston College researchers report developing a device that can bend light along complex pathways. The illustration shows a simulated electromagnetic wave propagation. Guided by a set of instructions delivered by the device, the wave curves around the profile of the eastern US while behaving as if traveling in a straight line.

As directed by the researchers’ novel device, these beams continue to behave as if traveling in a straight line. In one computer simulation, Assist. Prof. of Physics Willie J. Padilla and researcher Nathan Landy revealed the device could steer a beam of light along the boundary of the US, stretching from Michigan to Maine, down the seaboard, around Florida and into the Louisiana bayou, the researchers report in the journal Optics Express (Aug. 2009, Vol. 17, Issue 17).

Read the full story: BC News Release>>

Science Daily | Science blog | Photonics.com | Nanowerk | Nanotechwire| Nanotechnology Now | Science Centric| PhysOrg | derStandard