Improving resolution of superlens based on solid immersion mechanism

Super-resolution imaging with superlens has been one of the fundamental research topics. Unfortunately, the resolution of superlens is inevitably restrained by material loss. To address the problem, we introduce the solid immersion mechanism into the slab superlens and the cylindrical superlens. The proposed solid immersion slab superlens(SISSL) and the solid immersion cylindrical superlens(SICSL) can improve the resolution by converting evanescent wave to propagating wave using high refractive index materials. From the perspective of applications, the cylindrical superlens with finite cross section and the ability of magnification or demagnification has more advantages than the slab superlens. Therefore,we focus on demonstrating analytically the super-resolution imaging of SICSL. Due to the impedance mismatching caused by solid immersion mechanism, the whispering gallery modes(WGMs) are excited between SICSL and the air interface.We clarify the excitation conditions of WGMs and analyze their influence on the imaging quality of SICSL. The SISSL and SICSL may pave a way to apply in lithography technique and real-time biomolecular imaging in future.

Dispersion effect in optical microscopy systems with a supersphere solid immersion lens

This paper studies the dispersion effect of the supersphere solid immersion lens （SIL） on a near field optical microscopy system by using the vector diffraction theory.Results show that when a real non-monochromatic beam illuminates a supersphere SIL microscopy,the dispersion effect of the SIL has an important influence on the image quality.As the wavelength bandwidth of the non-monochromatic beam increases,the size of the focused spot increases and its intensity decreases in near-field microscopy systems with a supersphere SIL.

Square Maxwell’s fish-eye lens for near-field broadband achromatic super-resolution imaging

Broadband super-resolution imaging is important in the optical field.To achieve super-resolution imaging,various lenses from a superlens to a solid immersion lens have been designed and fabricated in recent years.However,the imaging is unsatisfactory due to low work efficiency and narrow band.In this work,we propose a solid immersion square Maxwell's fish-eye lens,which realizes broadband(7-16 GHz)achromatic super-resolution imaging with full width at half-maximum around 0.2λ based on transformation optics at microwave frequencies.In addition,a super-resolution information transmission channel is also designed to realize long-distance multi-source super-resolution information transmission based on the super-resolution lens.With the development of 3D printing technology,the solid immersion Maxwell's fish-eye lens is expected to be fabricated in the high-frequency band.