Analysis for Multidimensional Airy Beams Generation and their Applications

1. One-Dimension Airy Beam Generation at Millimeter –Wave Band with a flexible single-

layer metasurface

The Airy beams exhibiting a profile of curved self-propagation was first predicted by

Balazs and Berry in 1979. Within the context of Quantum Mechanics, they were able to

demonstrate that the Schrodinger equation produces non-spreading packet solutions for Airy

wave. Unlike other non-diffracting beams, the Airy beam exhibits extraordinary freely

accelerating features without any external potential. Different researches have been carried out in

the past to study the Airy beam, such as the micromachining of curved structures with laser,

curved plasma channels generation, and micromanipulation of optics. The traditional method for

generating Airy beams is based on spatial light modulators. This method utilizes lens to realize

Fourier transform which consequently affects the compactness of the terahertz (THz) and optical

system hence limiting the application of this method in the nanotechnology and integration field.

Metasurface, commonly referred to as planar and ultrathin structures, is defined as a 2D structure

artificially designed to produce unpredictable electromagnetic wave wavefront, is an important

component that can be used to control the phase and amplitude of the scattered wave. Over the

recent past, metasurface has replaced traditionally used millimeter-wave (MMW) and bulky

optical components to provide an easy and flexible way of generating Airy beams with both

Amplitude and phase modulation.

In an experiment to realize both amplitude and phase modulation, Miao et al. (2018)

employed a rectangular split-ring resonator (RSRR) with varying sizes of aperture. The RSRR’s

aperture defects and interact with the incident wave resulting in the transfer of current. The
electrical field is simultaneously converted perpendicularly to the original field. Due to the

continuity boundary condition of the cross-polarized field across the surface, transmitted and

reflected fields occur at the same time although only the former is taken into consideration. The

phase transmission range between 0 and 2π and control of the amplitude was achieved by

adjusting the aperture size and tilting the angle of the aperture respectively. To avoid unexpected

effects or diffraction, a unit cell period was set at 1.5mm. FEKO, full-wave simulation software

was then used to analyze the electromagnetic response of the element used with periodic

boundary conditions. The team was able to prove the unique characteristics of Airy beams with

the metasurface at the MMW band.

a layer of the metasurface. Metasurface significantly eases the difficulty experienced when

simultaneously controlling the amplitude and phase modulation. The RSRR encodes the profile

of the Airy beam by substituting it with tilt angles of cells. The properties of Airy beams that

include self-healing, self-bending, and non-diffracting, can be easily be proved by experiment at

millimeter-wave (MMW) and metasurface subjected to full-wave simulation.

2. Two-Dimensional Microwave Airy Beam Generation on Single-Layer Metasurface

Diffraction is a basic phenomenon for all classical waves and is also considered an

important property in quantum mechanics for uncertainty relations. Therefore, the diffractive

spreading can be exhibited by electromagnetic (EM) waves along the coordinate of a source of

propagation to a far-field. However, the Bessel wave can theoretically propagate without

exhibiting any diffraction. Various past studies have suggested other non-diffracting waves

especially those with parabolic functions such as Mathieu and higher-order Bessel beams. Balazs

and Berry discovered an Airy wave packet without diffraction property using the Schrödinger

equation. Unlike other non-diffractive beams proposed earlier, the Airy beam exhibits

acceleration in free space without external force. With the numerous remarkable characteristics

of Airy beam such as self-bending, self-healing, and non-diffraction, several potential

applications have been suggested, for instance, the generation of plasma channel and

micromanipulation and mediation of particle clearing using optics. Several methods for

generating the Airy beam have been proposed, and most use Fourier transform and Gaussian

beam’s cubic-phase modulation.

to control the phase, amplitude, and polarization of an electromagnetic incident wave. Most of

these methods proposed operate at terahertz and optical frequencies and the findings in the mm-

wave and microwave bands can only be described with theoretical analyses. Due to the

fascinating properties of the Airy beam, researchers have attempted to experimentally synthesize

mm-wave and microwave non-diffraction electromagnetic waves, including Bessel and Airy

beams, using metasurfaces because of their exciting potential applications that include

facilitation of secured communication and high-efficiency wireless power transfer over a long-

distance. However, due to multilayer configurations and large unit cells used in the case of the

airy beam, accurate results cannot be achieved because of limited sampling resolution of the

field, and it is possible to demonstrate one-dimensional Airy beam experimentally.

Huang et al (2020) proposed a method to experimentally generate a 2-D Airy beam. The

team generated the Airy beam at the microwave frequency of 5.86 Gigahertz and also a range of

5.82 GHz – 5.9 GHz with only a single-layer of metasurface which was based on a C-shaped

complementary split-ring resonator (C-SRR) unit. The C-SRR unit is compact and has high

cross-polarization transmission efficiency. Additionally, the amplitude of the cross-polarization

transmission coefficient on the C-SRR can be controlled gradually by applying a rotation. This

procedure has no significant effect on the cross-polarization transmission coefficient phase. Just

like other dimensions of Airy beams, a 2-D Airy beam has several important features that include

self-healing, self-bending, and seemingly non-diffraction properties.

wave with and without a metallic obstacle.

Huang et al. demonstrated that a microwave 2-D Airy beam can be synthesized with longer or

shorter quasi-nondiffraction propagation distance, less or more sidelobes, and also longer or

smaller size of main-lobe. The efficiency of the 2-D Airy beam generation relies on the

efficiency of polarization power conversion efficiency of the unit cells.

3. Strategy for Generation and Manipulating the Trajectory of Airy Beam Photonic

Interconnection in Free-Space

High bandwidth with flexible connectivity is ideally suitable for scaling up the

performance of both outdoor and indoor interconnection applications. The free-space photonic

interconnection offers flexible and large bandwidth connections in three-dimension without

causing interference among the paths of light. Typically, the free-space interconnection light path

is a line-of-sight path that connects the transmitter and the receiver. Over the recent past,

researchers have been drawn into the attention by self-accelerating beams and they have focused

on studying their fascinating localized bending trajectory with peak intensity, and other

characteristics such as self-healing after obstacles in free-space. A flexible three-dimensional

photonic interconnection in free-space can be understood with the curved trajectory of the beams
and the receiver placed along that bending trajectory. Consequently, free-space reach

enhancement can be achieved by self-advancing beams’ main lobe which exhibits diffraction

resistance without clear divergence.

Caustic theory play a major role in the design of self-accelerating beams having arbitrary

trajectories, and the decomposition of beams into Airy function series. The theory used can either

be from real space modulation or Fourier. By taking into account the error in phase modulation

of the spatial light modulator (SLM) and pixel discretization, the beams generated for the Fourier

modulation is higher in quality than those generated for real space modulation because they

occur in far-field. Therefore, Fourier modulation with the use of lens is commonly applied in the

investigation of Airy beam generation. The generation of Airy beam involves phase-type

modulation of Gaussian beam of the spatial light modulator with a cubic-type phase mask. The

Airy beam is obtained by performing the Inverse Fourier Transformation (IFT) by the lens. The

self-accelerating beam’s main lobe possesses most of the beam’s energy and it travels along the

bending trajectory. Therefore, photonic interconnection in free space can be produced by its

bending trajectory with localized power.

moving the main lobe of the beam in free-space by placing the receiver close to the bending

curve. Nevertheless, it is not always possible to maintain a bending trajectory as that of a

theoretical design. The bending trajectory of experimentally generated beams is in the process of

the transient state due to limitations of aperture and spatial bandwidth. A 3D Airy beam can be
generated by manipulating a 2D Airy beam which is generated mainly by Fourier modulation.

With the increasing propagation distance of free-space, the boundary formed between side and

main lobes disappears and the two lobes merge into a Gauss-shaped beam. As a result, the

evaluation of the self-accelerating beam’s propagation characteristics in free-space and

identification of bending trajectory range requires a metric to guide optimization of free-space

interconnection reach.

REFERENCES

[1]. L. Zhu, Z. Yang, S. Fu, Z. Cao, Y. W, Y.Qin, and J. Koonen, “Airy Beam for Free-Space

Photonic Interconnection: Generation Strategy and Trajectory Manipulation”, Journal of

Lightwave Technology, vol. 38, no. 23, Dec. 2020.

[2]. Y. Huang, J. Li, H. Xu, Z. Yang, Y. Zhao, H. Wei, I. Daniele, and W. Guangjun,

“Experimental Demonstration of Microwave Two-Dimensional Airy Beam Generation Based on

Single-Layer Metasurface” IEEE Transactions on Antennas and Propagation, Vol. 68, No. 11.

Nov. 2020.

[3]. Z.W. Miao, Z.C. Hao, and Q. Yuan, “Generation of One-Dimensional Airy Beams by a

Single-layer Flexible Metasurface at Millimeter-Wave Band”, Proceedings of 2018 Asian-

Pasific Microwave Conference. pp. 645-647, Nov. 2018.