Super-Planckian Near-Field Thermal Emission with Phonon-Polaritonic Hyperbolic Metamaterials

TL;DR

This paper investigates super-Planckian near-field heat transfer in multilayer hyperbolic metamaterials, revealing that emission can originate from surface phonon-polaritons or hyperbolic modes depending on material and structure.

Contribution

It provides a detailed analysis of near-field heat exchange mechanisms in hyperbolic metamaterials using exact S-matrix calculations, highlighting the conditions for super-Planckian emission.

Findings

Super-Planckian heat transfer can arise from surface phonon-polaritons or hyperbolic modes.

The emission characteristics depend on material composition and structural configuration.

Exact S-matrix calculations effectively model near-field heat exchanges in multilayer structures.

Abstract

We study super-Planckian near-field heat exchanges for multilayer hyperbolic metamaterials using exact S-matrix calculations. We investigate heat exchanges between two multilayer hyperbolic metamaterial structures. We show that the super- Planckian emission of such metamaterials can either come from the presence of surface phonon-polaritons modes or from a continuum of hyperbolic modes depending on the choice of composite materials as well as the structural configuration.