Babinet-complementary structures for implementation of pseudospin-polarized waveguides

Abstract

In this work, a theorem is proved stating that in various types of waveguides with mirror reflection symmetries, the electromagnetic duality correspondence between eigenmodes of complementary structures induces counterpropagating spin-polarized states. The mirror reflection symmetries may be preserved around one or more arbitrary planes. Pseudospin-polarized waveguides supporting one-way states manifest robustness. This is similar to topologically non-trivial direction-dependent states guided by photonic topological insulators. Nevertheless, a remarkable aspect of our structures is that they can be implemented in extremely broad bandwidth by simply using complementary structures. Based on our theory, the concept of the pseudospin polarized waveguide can be realized using dual impedance surfaces ranging from microwave to optical regime. Consequently, there is no need to employ bulk electromagnetic materials to suppress backscattering in waveguiding structures. This also includes pseudospin-polarized waveguides with perfect electric conductor-perfect magnetic conductor boundaries where the boundary conditions limit the bandwidth of waveguides. We design and develop various unidirectional systems and the spin-filtered feature in the microwave regime is further investigated.