Enhancement of evanescent waves inside media with extreme optical anisotropy

TL;DR

This paper demonstrates that media with extreme optical anisotropy can significantly enhance evanescent waves, enabling potential subwavelength imaging over larger distances with minimal sensitivity to material losses.

Contribution

It reveals a novel phenomenon of evanescent wave enhancement in anisotropic media, facilitating improved imaging capabilities.

Findings

Evanescent waves are significantly enhanced inside anisotropic media.

The enhancement is due to standing wave formation and is weakly affected by material losses.

Potential for subwavelength imaging at larger distances is demonstrated.

Abstract

Significant enhancement of evanescent spatial harmonics inside the slabs of media with extreme optical anisotropy is revealed. This phenomenon results from the pumping of standing waves and has the feature of being weakly sensitive to the material losses. Such characteristics may enable subwavelength imaging at considerable distances away from the objects.