Full-space dual-helicity decoupled metasurface for a high-efficiency multi-folded reflective antenna

The independent tailoring of electromagnetic waves with different circular-polarized (CP) wavefront in both reflection and transmission channels is of broad scientific and technical interest, offering ultimate degrees of freedom in designing advanced devices with the merits of functionality integration and spatial exploitation. However, most metasurfaces only provide dependent wavefront control of dual-helicity in a single channel, restricting their applications to limited practical scenarios. Herein, we propose a full-space dual-helicity decoupled metasurface and apply it to assemble a multi-folded reflective antenna (MFRA) in the microwave regime. A multilayered chiral meta-atom is designed and optimized to reflect a particular helical wave while allowing the orthogonal helical wave to penetrate through, with simultaneous full span of phase modulations in both channels. When a uniform reflection and a hyperbolic transmission phase profile is imposed simultaneously on the metasurface in a polarization-selective manner, it can be engineered to conduct specular reflection for one helical wave and convergent transmission of the other helical wave. Combining the proposed metasurface with a metallic plate as a bottom reflector and an integrated microstrip patch antenna in the center of metasurface as a feed, a MFRA is realized with a low profile, high efficiency, and high polarization purity in a broad frequency band. The proposed design method of the dual-helicity decoupled metasurface and its antenna application provide opportunities for high-performance functional devices, promising more potential in future communication and detection systems.(c) 2022 Optica Publishing Group under the terms of the Optica Open Access Publishing Agreement