Optomechanical Self-Stability of Freestanding Photonic Metasurfaces

TL;DR

This paper presents an analytical framework for the self-stabilization of freestanding photonic metasurfaces, enabling efficient design and control of their optomechanical stability in three dimensions.

Contribution

It introduces a universal analytical approach to analyze and optimize the mechanical stability of 3D metasurfaces under optical forces, simplifying complex stability problems.

Findings

Derived universal stiffness coefficients for arbitrary 3D metasurfaces.

Framework enables efficient discovery of optimal metasurface designs.

Facilitates long-range and macroscale optical manipulation.

Abstract

We develop an analytical framework for self-stabilizing optical manipulation of freestanding metasurfaces in three dimensions. Our framework reveals that the challenging problem of stabilization against translational and rotational perturbations in three dimensions is reduced to a simpler scattering analysis of the metasurface unit cell in two dimensions. We derive universal analytical stiffness coefficients applicable to arbitrary three-dimensional radial metasurfaces and radial beam intensity profiles. The analytical nature of our framework facilitates highly efficient discovery of optimal optomechanical metasurfaces. Such use of metasurfaces for mechanical stabilization enables macroscale and long-range control in collimated, but otherwise unfocused light beams, and could open up new avenues for manipulation beyond traditional optical tweezing and transport.