Eutectic Fibers with Self-Organized Structures

Recently, artificially constructed metamaterials have become of considerable interest, because these materials can exhibit electromagnetic characteristics unlike those of any conventional materials. Artificial magnetism and negative refractive index are two specific types of behavior that have been demonstrated over the past few years, illustrating the new physics and new applications possible when we expand our view as to what constitutes a material. In this review, we describe recent advances in metamaterials research and discuss the potential that these materials may hold for realizing new and seemingly exotic electromagnetic phenomena.

With a conventional lens sharpness of the image is always limited by the wavelength of light. An unconventional alternative to a lens, a slab of negative refractive index material, has the power to focus all Fourier components of a 2D image, even those that do not propagate in a radiative manner. Such "superlenses" can be realized in the microwave band with current technology. Our simulations show that a version of the lens operating at the frequency of visible light can be realized in the form of a thin slab of silver. This optical version resolves objects only a few nanometers across.