Tunable millimeter and sub-millimeter spectral response of textile metamaterial via resonant states.

We report on a new textile metamaterial created by adding metal wires directly into the polymer yarn. Split-ring resonator-like extended states are created. Simulations revealed that the extended states can be easily tuned via the geometry. Measurements of the transmittance spectrum as a function of the polarization angle in the low terahertz range were also performed and these peaks were ascribed to a polarization-dependent resonator model. The fabrics are viable candidates for flexible and deformable gigahertz and terahertz-enabled metamaterials.

Enabling high-temperature nanophotonics for energy applications.

The nascent field of high-temperature nanophotonics could potentially enable many important solid-state energy conversion applications, such as thermophotovoltaic energy generation, selective solar absorption, and selective emission of light. However, special challenges arise when trying to design nanophotonic materials with precisely tailored optical properties that can operate at high-temperatures (> 1,100 K). These include proper material selection and purity to prevent melting, evaporation, or chemical reactions; severe minimization of any material interfaces to prevent thermomechanical problems such as delamination; robust performance in the presence of surface diffusion; and long-range geometric precision over large areas with severe minimization of very small feature sizes to maintain structural stability. Here we report an approach for high-temperature nanophotonics that surmounts all of these difficulties. It consists of an analytical and computationally guided design involving high-purity tungsten in a precisely fabricated photonic crystal slab geometry (specifically chosen to eliminate interfaces arising from layer-by-layer fabrication) optimized for high performance and robustness in the presence of roughness, fabrication errors, and surface diffusion. It offers near-ultimate short-wavelength emittance and low, ultra-broadband long-wavelength emittance, along with a sharp cutoff offering 41 emittance contrast over 10% wavelength separation. This is achieved via Q-matching, whereby the absorptive and radiative rates of the photonic crystal's cavity resonances are matched. Strong angular emission selectivity is also observed, with short-wavelength emission suppressed by 50% at 75° compared to normal incidence. Finally, a precise high-temperature measurement technique is developed to confirm that emission at 1,225 K can be primarily confined to wavelengths shorter than the cutoff wavelength.

Tailoring photonic metamaterial resonances for thermal radiation.

Selective solar absorbers generally have limited effectiveness in unconcentrated sunlight, because of reradiation losses over a broad range of wavelengths and angles. However, metamaterials offer the potential to limit radiation exchange to a proscribed range of angles and wavelengths, which has the potential to dramatically boost performance. After globally optimizing one particular class of such designs, we find thermal transfer efficiencies of 78% at temperatures over 1,000°C, with overall system energy conversion efficiencies of 37%, exceeding the Shockley-Quiesser efficiency limit of 31% for photovoltaic conversion under unconcentrated sunlight. This represents a 250% increase in efficiency and 94% decrease in selective emitter area compared to a standard, angular-insensitive selective absorber.PACS: 42.70.Qs; 81.05.Xj; 78.67.Pt; 42.79.Ek.

Design and global optimization of high-efficiency thermophotovoltaic systems.

Despite their great promise, small experimental thermophotovoltaic (TPV) systems at 1000 K generally exhibit extremely low power conversion efficiencies (approximately 1%), due to heat losses such as thermal emission of undesirable mid-wavelength infrared radiation. Photonic crystals (PhC) have the potential to strongly suppress such losses. However, PhC-based designs present a set of non-convex optimization problems requiring efficient objective function evaluation and global optimization algorithms. Both are applied to two example systems: improved micro-TPV generators and solar thermal TPV systems. Micro-TPV reactors experience up to a 27-fold increase in their efficiency and power output; solar thermal TPV systems see an even greater 45-fold increase in their efficiency (exceeding the Shockley-Quiesser limit for a single-junction photovoltaic cell).

Global optimization of silicon photovoltaic cell front coatings.

The front-coating (FC) of a solar cell controls its efficiency, determining admission of light into the absorbing material and potentially trapping light to enhance thin absorbers. Single-layer FC designs are well known, especially for thick absorbers where their only purpose is to reduce reflections. Multilayer FCs could improve performance, but require global optimization to design. For narrow bandwidths, one can always achieve nearly 100% absorption. For the entire solar bandwidth, however, a second FC layer improves performance by 6.1% for 256 microm wafer-based cells, or by 3.6% for 2 microm thin-film cells, while additional layers yield rapidly diminishing returns.