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Problem
Current technology for manipulating UV light waves is largely based on “conventional” optical elements, whose working principles are based on light refraction or diffraction. These elements suffer from issues including large footprint, complicated (dedicated) manufacturing process, limited functionalities or operational bands (in contrast to their counterparts for the visible and infrared regimes), reduced operational efficiencies towards short wavelengths (e.g., for the deep-UV range), etc.
Invention
In this invention, we employ a novel approach to construct high-performance optical elements operating in the UV and deep-UV regime. Our technology is based on metasurfaces, where we design nanoantennas with sizes a fraction of the scale of the wavelength of UV light and arrange them over a planar surface. These nanoantennas collectively imprint arbitrary amplitude, phase, or polarization manipulations on incident UV light.
Potential Commercial Applications
To date, a technical solution enabling the implementation of ultraviolet metasurfaces with sufficiently low optical loss for commercial applications has not been available. Our invention fully breaks through the materials and fabrication barrier standing in the way of realizing ultraviolet materials and offers a practical, commercially scalable method to do so.
Metasurfaces for important markets in the ultraviolet space, such as for imaging, lithography, or quantum clocking and computing, are not yet commercially realizable due to the lack of available technology to date for implementing such metasurfaces.
Competitive Advantage
This invention opens opportunities for the creation of low-loss, multifunctional, and “flat” optical elements for operation in the near-, mid-, and deep-ultraviolet regimes, that are ideally suited for integration into compact nanophotonic systems.