MEMS reconfigurable metamaterial for terahertz switchable filter and modulator

We demonstrate a reconfigurable metamaterial developed by surface micromachining technique on a low loss quartz substrate for a tunable terahertz filter application. The device implements a reconfigurable RF-MEMS (radio frequency - micro electro mechanical systems) capacitor within a split-ring resonator (SRR). Time-domain spectroscopy confirms that the tunability of the SRR resonance and thus the terahertz transmittance are electrostatically controlled by the RF-MEMS capacitor. Due to the high transparency and low loss of quartz used as a substrate, the device exhibits a high contrast switching performance of 16.5 dB at 480 GHz, which is also supported by the terahertz dynamic modulation measurement results. The device shows promise for tunable transmission terahertz optics. (C) 2014 Optical Society of America