Metasurface-Based Multidimensional Light-Field Manipulation: From Technologies to Applications

Metasurfaces composed of subwavelength meta-atoms provide an ultrathin and highly integrable platform for manipulating optical wavefronts and have reshaped the development of flat optics and meta-optics. Beyond conventional single-parameter phase engineering, recent advances have enabled coordinated control of multiple degrees of freedom of light, including phase, amplitude, polarization, wavelength, spatiotemporal mode, and orbital angular momentum (OAM). This review summarizes the physical principles, implementation strategies, and representative applications of metasurface-based multidimensional light-field manipulation. We first discuss the fundamental mechanisms of metasurface-based light-field manipulation, including generalized Snell's law, phase discontinuity, meta-atom scattering, and the modulation of basic optical degrees of freedom. We then review major multidimensional design strategies, such as joint phase-amplitude, phase-polarization, phase-wavelength, phase-OAM, spatial-polarization, temporal-phase, and higher-dimensional control. Representative applications in optical information processing, computational imaging, holographic and near-eye display, optical communication, structured-light generation, and optical manipulation are further discussed. Finally, we highlight current challenges associated with efficiency, bandwidth, crosstalk, dynamic reconfigurability, fabrication tolerance, scalable manufacturing, and system-level integration, and outline future opportunities in metasurface-based multidimensional light-field manipulation.