Aperiodicity is more effective than disorder in localizing electromagnetic waves [Invited]

Abstract

Strong localization of electromagnetic waves in 3D has never been experimentally achieved in uncorrelated disordered systems. By going beyond the paradigm of disordered systems, this goal has been recently reached in deterministic aperiodic planar Vogel spiral arrays in the microwave regime. Here we present a comprehensive description of the experimental details that have been used to observe electromagnetic localization in Vogel spirals beyond 2D. By providing an experimental roadmap to describe microwave transport in Vogel spirals we introduce a novel system platform to demonstrate electromagnetic localization in 3D that outperforms traditional disordered systems for that purpose.