Rapid Prototyping of Anomalous Reflective Metasurfaces Using Spray-Coated Liquid Metal

Reconfigurable intelligent surfaces (RISs) have the potential to improve wireless communication links by dynamically redirecting signals to dead spots. Although a reconfigurable surface is best suited for environments in which the reflected signal must be dynamically steered, there are cases where a...

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Veröffentlicht in:Materials 2024-05, Vol.17 (9), p.2003
Hauptverfasser: Manio, Glan Allan V, Kouchi, Matthew T, Dacuycuy, Saige J, Ohta, Aaron T, Shiroma, Wayne A
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Sprache:eng
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Zusammenfassung:Reconfigurable intelligent surfaces (RISs) have the potential to improve wireless communication links by dynamically redirecting signals to dead spots. Although a reconfigurable surface is best suited for environments in which the reflected signal must be dynamically steered, there are cases where a static, non-reconfigurable anomalous reflective metasurface can suffice. In this work, spray-coated liquid metal is used to rapidly prototype an anomalous reflective metasurface. Using a pressurized air gun and a plastic thin-film mask, a metasurface consisting of a 6 × 4 array of Galinstan liquid-metal elements is sprayed within minutes. The metasurface produces a reflected wave at an angle of 28° from normal in response to a normal incident 3.5-GHz electromagnetic plane wave. The spray-coated liquid-metal metasurface shows comparable results to an anomalous reflective metasurface with copper elements of the same dimensions, demonstrating that this liquid-metal fabrication process is a viable solution for the rapid prototyping of anomalous reflective metasurfaces.
ISSN:1996-1944
1996-1944
DOI:10.3390/ma17092003