Multi-mode vortex beams generation with single-layer transmissive metasurface

Orbital angular momentum (OAM) is a phenomenon of vortex phase distribution in free space, the infinity of whose modes and the orthogonality between modes allow it to possess great potential in enhancing channel capacity. A transmissive metasurface consisting of a single-layer substrate and a two-layer metallic structure is proposed to enable vortex beam generation based on the concept of the Pancharatnam-Berry (PB) phase. The phase response is achieved by continuous phase modulation under circularly polarised (CP) wave incidence due to the simultaneous rotation of the upper and lower metal structures. Besides, through the introduction of both phase compensation on the metasurface and phase superposition of the beams to the array design, multi-beam generation is expected to be realized. A metasurface sample composed of 30 × 30 elements (450 mm × 450 mm) is fabricated and measured in a microwave darkroom on the basis of the simulation results. Both the simulation and measurement results provide firm demonstration that the designed metasurface is capable of simultaneously generating four beams carrying OAM mode numbers of ± 1 / ± 2 and different beam directions at the same aperture. The designed metasurface in this paper utilized for generating multi-mode vortex multi-beams will be of wide application in multi-channel transmission in wireless communication systems.