volume | PIER Journals

Abstract

This study proposes designing and developing a metamaterial absorber that improves the efficiency of solar cells. The design includes circular forms with rectangle gaps etched on the upper surface of an FR-4 substrate, with a copper sheet serving as an isolating substrate for the ground beneath. The structure operates in the tera frequency ranges to accommodate all infrared wavelengths of the sun's spectrum. Furthermore, the constructed metamaterial unit cell is used to build a metamaterial array absorber, which increases the rate of energy harvest from the sun spectrum. The two designs showed absorption rates of approximately 96.75% and 99.85% at 94.85 THz and 109.08 THz resonant frequencies respectively. In addition, a top surface of microwave cross-polarization conversion (CPC) is also generated and simulated. The structure of the proposed microwave unit cell consists of the same metamaterial absorber design. Efficient cross-conversion is achieved across a wide frequency band (9 GHz to 15 GHz), with polarization conversion effectiveness exceeding 99%. The suggested CPC design has three resonance bands with 50% fractional bandwidth (FBW) and achieves a stable polarization response at oblique incidence angles up to 35˚.

1. Mulla, B. and C. Sabah, "Perfect metamaterial absorber design for solar cell applications," Waves in Random and Complex Media, Vol. 25, No. 3, 382-392, 2015.

2. Bagmanci, Mehmet, Muharrem Karaaslan, Emin Unal, Oguzhan Akgol, Mehmet Bakir, and Cumali Sabah, "Solar energy harvesting with ultra-broadband metamaterial absorber," International Journal of Modern Physics B, Vol. 33, No. 8, 1950056, 2019.

3. Rufangura, Patrick and Cumali Sabah, "Wide-band polarization independent perfect metamaterial absorber based on concentric rings topology for solar cells application," Journal of Alloys and Compounds, Vol. 680, 473-479, 2016.

4. Hamdy, Hagar, Ghada Yassin Abdel-Latif, M. El-Agamy, H. A. El-Mikati, Mohamed Farhat O. Hameed, and S. S. A. Obayya, "Wavelength-selective metamaterial absorber based on 2D split rhombus grating for thermophotovoltic solar cell," Optical and Quantum Electronics, Vol. 54, No. 2, 117, 2022.

5. Dincer, Furkan, Oguzhan Akgol, Muharrem Karaaslan, Emin Unal, and Cumali Sabah, "Polarization angle independent perfect metamaterial absorbers for solar cell applications in the microwave, infrared, and visible regime," Progress In Electromagnetics Research, Vol. 144, 93-101, 2014.

6. Li, Jichun, Yitung Chen, and Yang Liu, "Mathematical simulation of metamaterial solar cells," Advances in Applied Mathematics and Mechanics, Vol. 3, No. 6, 702-715, 2011.

7. Herold, Victor Du John, Blessy Antony, Neelapala Nava Teja, and Vinod Gandikota, "Wide band metamaterial absorber for gallium arsenide GaAs solar cells," 2021 3rd International Conference on Signal Processing and Communication (ICPSC), 578-580, Coimbatore, India, 2021.

8. Zhang, Yubin, Zao Yi, Xinyue Wang, Peixin Chu, Weitang Yao, Zigang Zhou, Shubo Cheng, Zhimin Liu, Pinghui Wu, Miao Pan, and Yougen Yi, "Dual band visible metamaterial absorbers based on four identical ring patches," Physica E: Low-dimensional Systems and Nanostructures, Vol. 127, 114526, 2021.

9. Yu, Jing, Tingting Lang, and Huateng Chen, "All-metal terahertz metamaterial absorber and refractive index sensing performance," Photonics, Vol. 8, No. 5, 164, 2021.

10. Tao, Hu, Christopher M. Bingham, D. Pilon, Kebin Fan, Andrew C. Strikwerda, David Shrekenhamer, Willie J. Padilla, Xin Zhang, and Richard D. Averitt, "A dual band terahertz metamaterial absorber," Journal of Physics D: Applied Physics, Vol. 43, No. 22, 225102, 2010.

11. Cho, A., "Voilà! Cloak of invisibility unveiled," Science, Vol. 314, No. 5798, 403, 2006.
doi:10.1126/science.314.5798.403

12. Veselago, V. G., "The electrodynamics of substances with simultaneously negative values of ε and μ," Soviet Physics Uspekhi, Vol. 10, No. 4, 509-514, 1968.
doi:10.1070/PU1968v010n04ABEH003699

13. Fang, Nicholas, Hyesog Lee, Cheng Sun, and Xiang Zhang, "Sub-diffraction-limited optical imaging with a silver superlens," Science, Vol. 308, No. 5721, 534-537, 2005.
doi:10.1126/science.1108759

14. Berland, B., "Photovoltaic technologies beyond the horizon: Optical rectenna solar cell," National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL), 2003.

15. Sabaawi, Ahmed M. A., Charalampos C. Tsimenidis, and Bayan S. Sharif, "Infra-red nano-antennas for solar energy collection," 2011 Loughborough Antennas & Propagation Conference, 1-4, Loughborough, UK, 2011.

16. Bozzetti, M., G. de Candia, M. Gallo, O. Losito, L. Mescia, and F. Prudenzano, "Analysis and design of a solar rectenna," 2010 IEEE International Symposium on Industrial Electronics, Bari, Italy, 2010.

17. Zhang, Pengyu, Guoquan Chen, Zheyu Hou, Yizhuo Zhang, Jian Shen, Chaoyang Li, Maolin Zhao, Zhuozhen Gao, Zhiqi Li, and Tingting Tang, "Ultra-broadband tunable terahertz metamaterial absorber based on double-layer vanadium dioxide square ring arrays," Micromachines, Vol. 13, No. 5, 669, 2022.

18. Ustunsoy, Mehmet Pasa and Cumali Sabah, "Dual-band high-frequency metamaterial absorber based on patch resonator for solar cell applications and its enhancement with graphene layers," Journal of Alloys and Compounds, Vol. 687, 514-520, 2016.

19. Tang, Jingyao, Zhongyin Xiao, and Kaikai Xu, "Ultra-thin metamaterial absorber with extremely bandwidth for solar cell and sensing applications in visible region," Optical Materials, Vol. 60, 142-147, 2016.

20. Montaser, Ahmed M., "Design of multiband PIFA with low SAR value for all commercial mobile communication bands," International Journal of RF and Microwave Computer-Aided Engineering, Vol. 25, No. 3, 194-201, 2015.

21. El Dein, Adel Z., Adel B. Abdel-Rahman, Raafat E. Fat-Helbary, and A. M. Montaser, "Tunable-compact bandstop defected ground structure (DGS) with lumped element," 2010 7th International Multi-Conference on Systems, Signals and Devices, 1-3, Amman, Jordan, 2010.

22. Montaser, Ahmed M., Korany R. Mahmoud, Adel B. Abdel-Rahman, and Hamdy A. Elmikati, "Design Bluetooth and notched-UWB E-shape antenna using optimization techniques," Progress In Electromagnetics Research B, Vol. 47, 279-295, 2013.

23. Mahmoud, Korany R., Abdullah Baz, Wajdi Alhakami, Hosam Alhakami, and Ahmed M. Montaser, "The performance of circularly polarized phased sub-array antennas for 5G laptop devices investigating the radiation effects," Progress In Electromagnetics Research C, Vol. 110, 267-283, 2021.
doi:10.2528/PIERC21012005

24. Ghattas, Ayad Shohdy W., Ayman Ayd R. Saad, and Elsayed Esam M. Khaled, "Compact patch antenna array for 60 GHz millimeter-wave broadband applications," Wireless Personal Communications, Vol. 114, No. 4, 2821-2839, 2020.

25. Rufangura, Patrick and Cumali Sabah, "Design and characterization of a dual-band perfect metamaterial absorber for solar cell applications," Journal of Alloys and Compounds, Vol. 671, 43-50, 2016.

26. Akbari, Mohammad, Mohammadmahdi Farahani, Abdel-Razik Sebak, and Tayeb A. Denidni, "Ka-band linear to circular polarization converter based on multilayer slab with broadband performance," IEEE Access, Vol. 5, 17927-17937, 2017.

27. Akbari, Mohammad, Hamdan Abo Ghalyon, Mohammadmahdi Farahani, Abdel-Razik Sebak, and Tayeb A. Denidni, "Spatially decoupling of CP antennas based on FSS for 30-GHz MIMO systems," IEEE Access, Vol. 5, 6527-6537, 2017.

28. Akbari, M., S. Gupta, M. Farahani, A. R. Sebak, and T. A. Denidni, "Gain enhancement of circularly polarized dielectric resonator antenna based on FSS superstrate for MMW applications," IEEE Transactions on Antennas and Propagation, Vol. 64, No. 12, 5542-5546, 2016.

29. Moghadam, Marjan Sadat Jalali, Mohammad Akbari, Fereshteh Samadi, and Abdel-Razik Sebak, "Wideband cross polarization rotation based on reflective anisotropic surfaces," IEEE Access, Vol. 6, 15919-15925, 2018.

30. Yu, Nanfang, Patrice Genevet, Francesco Aieta, Mikhail A. Kats, Romain Blanchard, Guillaume Aoust, Jean-Philippe Tetienne, Zeno Gaburro, and Federico Capasso, "Flat optics: Controlling wavefronts with optical antenna metasurfaces," IEEE Journal of Selected Topics in Quantum Electronics, Vol. 19, No. 3, 4700423, 2013.

31. Grady, Nathaniel K., Jane E. Heyes, Dibakar Roy Chowdhury, Yong Zeng, Matthew T. Reiten, Abul K. Azad, Antoinette J. Taylor, Diego A. R. Dalvit, and Hou-Tong Chen, "Terahertz metamaterials for linear polarization conversion and anomalous refraction," Science, Vol. 340, No. 6138, 1304-1307, 2013.
doi:10.1126/science.1235399

32. Li, Guixin, Ming Kang, Shumei Chen, Shuang Zhang, Edwin Yue-Bun Pun, Kok Wai Cheah, and Jensen Li, "Spin-enabled plasmonic metasurfaces for manipulating orbital angular momentum of light," Nano Letters, Vol. 13, No. 9, 4148-4151, 2013.

33. Yang, Yuanmu, Wenyi Wang, Parikshit Moitra, Ivan I. Kravchenko, Dayrl P. Briggs, and Jason Valentine, "Dielectric meta-reflectarray for broadband linear polarization conversion and optical vortex generation," Nano Letters, Vol. 14, No. 3, 1394-1399, 2014.

34. Chen, Hong-Ya, Jia-Fu Wang, Hua Ma, Shao-Bo Qu, Jie-Qiu Zhang, Zhuo Xu, and An-Xue Zhang, "Broadband perfect polarization conversion metasurfaces," Chinese Physics B, Vol. 24, No. 1, 014201, 2015.

35. Grady, Nathaniel K., Jane E. Heyes, Dibakar Roy Chowdhury, Yong Zeng, Matthew T. Reiten, Abul K. Azad, Antoinette J. Taylor, Diego A. R. Dalvit, and Hou-Tong Chen, "Terahertz metamaterials for linear polarization conversion and anomalous refraction," Science, Vol. 340, No. 6138, 1304-1307, 2013.
doi:10.1126/science.1235399

36. Sun, Wujiong, Qiong He, Jiaming Hao, and Lei Zhou, "A transparent metamaterial to manipulate electromagnetic wave polarizations," Optics Letters, Vol. 36, No. 6, 927-929, 2011.

37. Ma, Hui Feng, Gui Zhen Wang, Gu Sheng Kong, and Tie Jun Cui, "Broadband circular and linear polarization conversions realized by thin birefringent reflective metasurfaces," Optical Materials Express, Vol. 4, No. 8, 1717-1724, 2014.

38. Zheng, Qi, Chenjiang Guo, Haixiong Li, and Jun Ding, "Wideband and high efficiency reflective polarization rotator based on metasurface," Journal of Electromagnetic Waves and Applications, Vol. 32, No. 3, 265-273, 2018.

39. Khan, Muhammad Ismail, Qaisar Fraz, and Farooq A. Tahir, "Ultra-wideband cross polarization conversion metasurface insensitive to incidence angle," Journal of Applied Physics, Vol. 121, No. 4, 045103, 2017.

40. Zhao, Yang and Andrea Alù, "Tailoring the dispersion of plasmonic nanorods to realize broadband optical meta-waveplates," Nano Letters, Vol. 13, No. 3, 1086-1091, 2013.

41. Sieber, P. E. and D. H. Werner, "Reconfigurable broadband infrared circularly polarizing reflectors based on phase changing birefringent metasurfaces," Optics Express, Vol. 21, No. 1, 1087-1100, 2013.

42. Grady, Nathaniel K., Jane E. Heyes, Dibakar Roy Chowdhury, Yong Zeng, Matthew T. Reiten, Abul K. Azad, Antoinette J. Taylor, Diego A. R. Dalvit, and Hou-Tong Chen, "Terahertz metamaterials for linear polarization conversion and anomalous refraction," Science, Vol. 340, No. 6138, 1304-1307, 2013.
doi:10.1126/science.1235399

43. Wu, Linxiao, Meng Zhang, Bo Zhu, Junming Zhao, Tian Jiang, and Yijun Feng, "Dual-band asymmetric electromagnetic wave transmission for dual polarizations in chiral metamaterial structure," Applied Physics B, Vol. 117, 527-531, 2014.

44. Zhu, H. L., S. W. Cheung, Kwok Lun Chung, and T. I. Yuk, "Linear-to-circular polarization conversion using metasurface," IEEE Transactions on Antennas and Propagation, Vol. 61, No. 9, 4615-4623, 2013.

45. Kundu, Debidas, Akhilesh Mohan, and Ajay Chakrabarty, "Ultrathin high-efficiency X-band reflective polarization converter using sunken double arrowhead metasurface," 2016 Asia-Pacific Microwave Conference (APMC), 1-4, New Delhi, India, 2016.

46. Khan, M. Ismail, Farooq A. Tahir, and Rashid Saleem, "An angularly stable tri-band reflective cross-polarization conversion anisotropic metasurface," 2017 Progress In Electromagnetics Research Symposium --- Fall (PIERS --- FALL), 1735-1737, Singapore, Nov. 2017.

47. Rashid, Aamir, Mudassir Murtaza, Syed Azhar Ali Zaidi, Hammad Zaki, and Farooq A. Tahir, "A single-layer, wideband and angularly stable metasurface based polarization converter for linear-to-linear cross-polarization conversion," PLOS One, Vol. 18, No. 1, e0280469, 2023.

48. Pandey, Anchal and Shashi B. Rana, "Review of metamaterials, types and design approaches," An International Journal of Engineering Sciences, Vol. 17, 359-363, 2016.

Dr. Asmaa El-Sayed Mohammed

Dr. Ayad Shohdy

Dr. Shazly Abdo Mohammed

Dr. Ahmed Mohamed Montaser