Energy considerations for a superlens based on metal/dielectric multilayers

TL;DR

This paper analyzes the resolution and absorption losses in a silver/gallium phosphide multilayer superlens, highlighting how lens placement affects losses and clarifying transmittance interpretations for evanescent waves.

Contribution

It provides a detailed investigation of energy losses and resolution independence in multilayer superlenses, offering insights into optimizing lens placement and understanding transmittance.

Findings

Absorption losses are higher for evanescent waves near the source.

Resolution remains constant regardless of lens position.

Transmittance values above unity are explained in terms of absorption.

Abstract

We investigate the resolution and absorption losses of a Ag/GaP multilayer superlens. For a fixed source to image distance the resolution is independent of the position of the lens but the losses depend strongly on the lens placement. The absorption losses associated with the evanescent waves can be significantly larger than losses associated with the propagating waves especially when the superlens is close to the source. The interpretation of transmittance values greater than unity for evanescent waves is clarified with respect to the associated absorption losses.