Research Summaries

Back Metamaterials for Counter Directed Energy Weapons

Fiscal Year 2016
Division Graduate School of Engineering & Applied Science
Department Physics
Investigator(s) Luscombe, James H.
Grbovic, Dragoslav
Sponsor Office of Naval Research (Navy)
Summary The proposed program would design, produce, characterize, and model metamaterials absorptive and energy-redirecting (MMs) for Counter Directed Energy Weapon (CDEW) applications. The project would build on the recent successful fabrication, at the Naval Postgraduate School (NPS), of passive, narrow-band MM sensors with high absorption in the microwave regime. That effort utilized NPS expertise in modeling and experimental characterization of THz MMs as well as theoretical expertise in electromagnetic (EM) theory. MMs, consisting of patterned metal layers separated by dielectric spacer layers, have a highly tunable spectral response and are absorbent over a narrow frequency range. MMs built at NPS have achieved close to 70% absorption in the X-band, but the concept allows for extension to other bands as well as an increase in absorption. MMs can also be designed to impedance match to free space, so that EM radiation can be guided away from regions to be protected against the effects of high-power radio-frequency (HPRF) weapons. We propose to build two types of MMs, those with broadband absorption, featuring novel spectral signature detection capabilities, as well as those that exhibit energy redirection. MMs with 'cloaking' abilities have been demonstrated under low-power conditions; it is unknown to what extent MMs can function as EM shields in high-field environments. Part of the difficulty in assessing the performance of MM-based EM shielding structures for CDEW applications is the lack of a theoretical framework for treating the nonlinear EM response of MMs. Part of the program would be devoted to developing a modeling capability for predicting the penetration of EM fields into MM structures in high-field regimes. The effort in the first year of the project has been selected for partial funding by the Naval Research Program (NRP) at NPS.
Keywords Absorber MW Metamaterial Microwave
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Data Publications, theses (not shown) and data repositories will be added to the portal record when information is available in FAIRS and brought back to the portal