Metamaterials are a type of artificial material which, as the prefix “meta”—meaning in Greek “after” or “beyond”—indicates, demonstrate electromagnetic properties and other characteristics not found in nature.

As a result of these characteristics, including negative refraction and perfect lensing and cloaking, which arise from the lattice design composition of these substances rather than the materials that actually comprise them, metamaterials have become a hot research topic.

In particular, materials scientists are actively hunting for metamaterials that are “perfect absorbers” of electromagnetic radiation with controllable resonance characteristics that lead to their wide usage in applications as varied as solar cells, thermal radiation imaging, sensing technology, and even stealth technology.

In a new paper in The European Physical Jour