Related Experiment Video
Updated: Jul 3, 2026

An Electrochemical Cholesteric Liquid Crystalline Device for Quick and Low-Voltage Color Modulation
Published on: February 27, 2019
Optical planar chiral metamaterial designs for strong circular dichroism and polarization rotation
Do-Hoon Kwon1, Pingjuan L Werner, Douglas H Werner
1Department of Electrical Engineering, Pennsylvania State University, University Park, Pennsylvania 16802, USA. dhw@psu.edu
Abstract:
Planar chiral metamaterials comprising double-layer dielectricmetal- dielectric resonant structures in the shape of a gammadion are presented in the near-infrared regime. The unit cell of the doubly-periodic metamaterial design is optimized using the genetic algorithm for maximum circular dichroism and for maximum optical activity. A circular dichroism value in excess of 50% is predicted for the optimized design. Maximum polarization rotatory powers in terms of the minimum allowed transmittances are also obtained and presented.
Related Concept Videos
Properties of Enantiomers and Optical Activity
Chirality
Chiral objects exhibit a sense of handedness when they interact with another chiral object. For example, our left foot can only fit in the left shoe and not in the right shoe. Achiral objects — objects that have...
Chirality in Nature
Prochirality
Molecules with Multiple Chiral Centers
Stereoisomerism
Isomers are different chemical species that have the same chemical formula.
Transition metal complexes often exist as geometric isomers, in which the same atoms are connected through the same types of bonds but with differences in their orientation in space. Coordination complexes with two different ligands in the cis and trans positions from a ligand of interest form isomers. For example, the octahedral [Co(NH3)4Cl2]+ ion has two isomers (Figure 1) In the cis...

