title: Soft and broadband infrared metamaterial absorber based on gold nanorod/liquid crystal hybrid with tunable total absorption.
abstract: We design a soft infrared metamaterial absorber based on gold nanorods dispersed in liquid crystal (LC) placed on a gold film and theoretically investigate its total absorption character. Because the nanorods align with the LC molecule, the gold nanorods/LC hybrid exhibits different permittivity as a function of tilt angle of LC. At a certain tilt angle, the absorber shows an omnidirectional total absorption effect. By changing the tilt angle of LC by an external electric field, the total absorption character can be adjusted. The total absorption character also depends on the concentration, geometric dimension of nanorods, and defect of nanorod arrangement in LC. When the LC contains different size of gold nanorods, a broadband absorption can be easily realized. The characteristics including flexibility, omnidirectional, broadband and tunability make the infrared metamaterial absorber possess potential use in smart metamaterial devices.
authors.affiliation: Smart Materials Laboratory, Department of Applied Physics, Northwestern Polytechnical University, Xi'an, 710129, China.
authors.forename: Zhaoxian
authors.initials: Z
authors.lastname: Su
authors.affiliation: Smart Materials Laboratory, Department of Applied Physics, Northwestern Polytechnical University, Xi'an, 710129, China.
authors.forename: Jianbo
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Yin
authors.affiliation: Smart Materials Laboratory, Department of Applied Physics, Northwestern Polytechnical University, Xi'an, 710129, China.
authors.forename: Xiaopeng
authors.initials: X
authors.lastname: Zhao