Magnetoelectric-field electrodynamics: Search for magnetoelectric point scatterers

TL;DR

This paper investigates the existence of magnetoelectric point scatterers that behave like artificial atoms with inherent magnetoelectricity, introducing the concept of ME-field electrodynamics and analyzing their unique near-field properties.

Contribution

It demonstrates the existence of mesoscopic structures acting as magnetoelectric point scatterers and develops the concept of ME-field electrodynamics with modified Maxwell equations.

Findings

Identification of mesoscopic structures with combined electric and magnetic dipole excitations.

Introduction of ME near fields characterized by symmetry violations.

Formulation of ME-field electrodynamics with pseudo-scalar source terms.

Abstract

Resonant scattering of electromagnetic (EM) waves by small particles is considered as one of the basic problem in metamaterial science. At present, special subwavelength resonators are considered as structural elements in chiral and bianisotropic metamaterials. There is a general consensus that these small scatterers behave like "artificial atoms", meta-atoms, with strong electrical and magnetic responses and an interconnection between these responses. However, the observed effect of magnetoelectric (ME) coupling in these meta-atoms is not associated with the near-field manipulation properties caused by intrinsic magnetoelectricity. This arises the question whether ME point scatterers of EM radiation really exist. In this paper, we show that there are mesoscopic structures with electric and magnetic dipole-carrying excitations that behave like point scatterers with their inherent magnetoelectricity. In such subwavelength resonators, coherent oscillations of the electric polarization and magnetization can be considered as quasistatic oscillations described by electrostatic (ES) and magnetostatic (MS) scalar wave functions. The ME resonance effect arises from the coupling of two, ES and MS, oscillations. The near fields of these resonators, called the ME near fields, are characterized by simultaneous violation of time reversal and inversion symmetry. In study of ME fields and EM problems associated with these fields, we put forward the concept of ME-field electrodynamics. Like the axion-field electrodynamics and the axion-polariton problem, we are talking about modified Maxwell equations with a presudoscalar source terms and the quantum field theory for massive particles. While the axion fields are boson scalar fields, the ME fields are fermionic fields. These fields are characterized by energy eigenstates with rotational superflows and quantized vortices.