Revisit of generalized Kerker's conditions using composite metamaterials

TL;DR

This paper presents a theoretical approach to designing composite metamaterials with large artificial magnetic permeability in the visible range, enabling the realization of Kerker's conditions for zero backward and forward scattering, which are impossible with natural materials.

Contribution

It introduces a method to engineer composite metamaterials with large magnetic permeability in the visible spectrum to achieve Kerker's scattering conditions.

Findings

Metamaterials can be designed to exhibit large artificial permeability.

Achieved Kerker's conditions with low imaginary part of refractive index.

Potential for high-performance nanophotonic device applications.

Abstract

Achieving zero backward scattering (ZBS) and zero forward scattering (ZFS), i.e., the so-called the first and second Kerker's conditions respectively, by sphere spherical particles is considered to be impossible due to the unavailability of naturally occurring magnetic materials in the visible frequency range. We report theoretical modeling to design composite metamaterials that present large optical magnetic permeability in the visible frequency range by employing Mie scattering theory and extended Maxwell Garnett theory. We numerically show that a careful selection of constituents of a composite metamaterial one can obtain metamaterials with sufficiently large artificial permeability that eventually provides the Kerker's criterion to achieve the Kereker's conditions. By taking realistic material parameters we demonstrate that the metamaterials exhibiting ZBS and ZFS have a small imaginary part of the refractive index than metallic structures that pave a path to design high-performance nanophotonic devices.