The main concepts dealing with negative refraction are clarified in order to understand if a high conductive metal layer thinner than the wavelength can really be considered as a metamaterial with a negative refraction index. The theoretical method to find the direction of phase velocity is clearly explained. The use of the causality principle is presented. We discuss why the negative refractive metamaterial has to be regarded as a dispersive one. Discussions are illustrated by means of FDTD simulations. The superlens application is presented. We explain why it is not obvious to consider a thin metal layer as a negative refractive material.

Date Published: 6 May 2008
PDF: 8 pages
Proc. SPIE 6987, Metamaterials III, 69870A (6 May 2008);

Published in SPIE Proceedings Vol. 6987:
Metamaterials III
Nigel P. Johnson; Ekmel Özbay; Nikolay I. Zheludev; Richard W. Ziolkowski, Editor(s)