Experimental study of electromagnetic wave scattering from a gyrotropic gaseous plasma column

Journal Article · 01 June 2022 · Applied Physics Letters

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1063/5.0095038 · OSTI ID:1979098

Houriez, Luc S.  ^[1]; Mehrpour Bernety, Hossein  ^[2]; Rodríguez, Jesse A.  ^[2]; Wang, Benjamin ^[2]; Cappelli, Mark A.  ^[2]

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1. Stanford Univ., CA (United States); Stanford Univ., Stanford, CA (United States)
2. Stanford Univ., CA (United States)

We experimentally demonstrate the controlled scattering of incident transverse-electric electromagnetic waves from a gyrotropic magnetized plasma cylindrical discharge. Scattered electromagnetic waves can bend left and right by changing the external magnetic field of a plasma rod. Measured scattered wavefronts are in good agreement with electromagnetic simulations. A gyrotropic response is observed for incident wave frequencies ranging from 3.5 to 5.6 GHz for conditions corresponding to a ratio of cyclotron frequency to plasma frequency, ω_ce/ω_p ≈ 0.16. In conclusion, the observation of a gyrotropic response from cylindrical plasma discharges paves the way for their use as building blocks for future devices such as magnetized plasma photonic crystals, topological insulators, plasma metamaterials, non-reciprocal waveguide structures, and other devices, which require a tunable gyrotropic response from centimeter to meter-scale materials with application-specific geometry.

• Research Organization: Krell Institute, Ames, IA (United States)
• Sponsoring Organization: USDOE Office of Science (SC), Advanced Scientific Computing Research (ASCR); US Air Force Office of Scientific Research (AFOSR)
• Grant/Contract Number: SC0019323
• OSTI ID: 1979098
• Journal Information: Applied Physics Letters, Journal Name: Applied Physics Letters Journal Issue: 22 Vol. 120; ISSN 0003-6951
• Publisher: American Institute of Physics (AIP)Copyright Statement
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English