Related Experiment Video
Updated: Feb 4, 2026

Angle-resolved Photoemission Spectroscopy At Ultra-low Temperatures
Published on: October 9, 2012
Temperature-mediated invocation of the vacuum state for switchable ultrawide-angle and broadband deflection
Andriy E Serebryannikov1,2, Akhlesh Lakhtakia3,4, Majid Aalizadeh5
1ESAT-TELEMIC, Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, 3000, Leuven, Belgium. aserebry@esat.kuleuven.be.
Abstract:
Temperature-mediated appearance and disappearance of a deflection grating in a diffracting structure is possible by employing InSb as the grating material. InSb transits from the dielectric state to the plasmonic state in the terahertz regime as the temperature increases, this transition being reversible. An intermediate state is the vacuum state in which the real part of the relative permittivity of InSb equals unity while the imaginary part is much smaller. Then the grating virtually disappears, deflection being impossible as only specular reflection can occur. This ON/OFF switching of deflection and relevant angular filtering are realizable over wide ranges of frequency and incidence angle by a temperature change of as low as 20 K. The vacuum state of InSb invoked for ON/OFF switching of deflection and relevant angular filtering can also be obtained for thermally tunable materials other than InSb as well as by using non-thermal mechanisms.
Related Concept Videos
Deflection of a Beam
Singularity functions, described in an earlier lesson, are powerful mathematical tools that represent discontinuities within a function commonly encountered in structural loading...
Maximum Deflection
The maximum deflection occurs at a specific point, known as point O, where the tangent to the deflection curve is horizontal. To find point O, the slope of the tangent at any...
Contact Angle
The adhesive force is the molecular force between molecules of different materials, that is, between the molecules of the solid and the liquid. The cohesive...
Open Angle Glaucoma: Treatment
Drugs such as carbonic anhydrase inhibitors, α2- and...
Angle of Twist: Problem Solving
Angle Closure Glaucoma: Treatment

