Ultra-wideband tunable metamaterial perfect absorber based on vanadium dioxide

A dynamically adjustable ultra-wideband metamaterial perfect absorber (MPA) is proposed which consists of three resonance rings based on vanadium dioxide (VO₂) and a metal ground layer separated by a dielectric spacer. The simulation results show that the terahertz (THz) absorption bandwidth of more than 90% absorptance reaches 3.30 THz, which covers from 2.34 to 5.64 THz, under different incident polarization angles. The range is better than that of previous VO₂-based reports. Moreover, when the conductivity of VO₂ changes from 200 S/m to 2×10⁵ S/m, the absorption peak intensity can be adjusted continuously from 4% to 100%. The key is to optimize the geometric structure through interference cancellation and impedance matching theory, to achieve better absorption bandwidth and efficiency. Besides, the terahertz absorber has a wide-angle absorption effect both in TE and TM waves. Thus, the designed absorber may have many potential applications in modulating, sensing and imaging technology.