Towards efficient random metasurfaces

TL;DR

This paper introduces a phase-map method for designing random metasurfaces, improving their efficiency by accounting for random near-field effects, and enabling advanced optical applications like cryptography.

Contribution

It presents a novel phase-map approach that considers statistical and near-field effects, enhancing the efficiency of random metasurfaces for optical device applications.

Findings

Efficiency increased by up to ~20%

Effective encoding of information using particle distribution statistics

Potential applications in secure optical cryptography

Abstract

Random media introduce large degrees of freedom in device design and can thus address challenges in manipulating optical waves. Wave shaping with metasurfaces has mainly utilized periodic or quasi-periodic grids, and, the potential of random arrangement of particles for devices has only come under investigation recently. The main difficulty in pursuing random metasurfaces is the identification of the degrees of freedom that optimize their efficiencies and functions. They can also encode information using the statistics of particles distribution. We propose a phase-map that accounts for the statistical nature of random media. The method takes into account effects of random near-field couplings that introduce phase errors by affecting the phase shift of elements. The proposed approach increases the efficiency of our random metasurface devices by up to ~20%. This work paves the way towards the efficient design of random metasurfaces with potential applications in highly secure optical cryptography and information encoding.