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The all silicon terahertz metasurface with sharp Fano resonance and its sensing applications with high Q factor have been investigated. Such metasurface, composed of periodic grooves, can be fabricated by deep silicon etching on high-resistivity silicon. When the refractive index of the sample changes, the shifted resonance frequency appears and the resonance intensity can be modulated by altering the surface conductivity. The Q characteristics of the metasurface and the applications of graphene sensing are then analyzed and verified. The results indicates that the Q factor of the metasurface can reach 39857, the standard sensitivity is 16042 nm/RIU, and the FOM is 533. Meanwhile, the characteristics of sensing graphene samples (∼1 nm) are very useful for sensing other ultra-thin materials or biomolecules.

The combination of VO2 and metasurfaces has opened an attractive route to dynamically control terahertz (THz) waves based on the giant conductivity change. However, the high-precision control of microfabrication and single performance of conductivity change limit the multifunctional application of VO2-based metasurfaces. Here, we proposed a VO2-metallic hybrid metasurface by in situ depositing high-quality VO2 thin films onto a metasurface composed of asymmetric Fano resonance units. It exhibits agile frequency and amplitude modulation for THz transmission across tuning the dielectric constant and conductivity of VO2. The metallic metasurface is designed as a matrix to achieve high transmission at 0.61 and 0.78 THz due to the split-ring resonance. During the thermally triggered phase transition of VO2, we found that the resonance frequency and amplitude can be tuned dominantly by the change of dielectric constant and conductivity, respectively. In particular, the increased dielectric constant enables red shift of the frequency by around 0.48 THz and the conductivity increases lead to a giant THz amplitude modulation of 88%. These results provide a route for developing VO2-based THz smart devices combined with functional metasurfaces and hold great promise for applications in THz sensor and modulation.

Abstract While myelin deficit of the central nervous system leads to several severe diseases, the definitive diagnostic means are lacking. We proposed and performed terahertz time-domain spectroscopy (THz-TDS) combined with chemometric techniques to discriminate and evaluate the severity of myelin deficit in mouse and rhesus monkey brains. The THz refractive index and absorption coefficient of paraffin-embedded brain tissues from both normal and mutant dysmyelinating mice are shown. Principal component analysis of time-domain THz signal (PCA-tdTHz) and absorption-refractive index relation of THz spectrum identified myelin deficit without exogenous labeling or any pretreatment. Further, with the established PCA-tdTHz, we evaluated the severity of myelin deficit lesions in rhesus monkey brain induced by experimental autoimmune encephalomyelitis, which is the most-studied animal model of multiple sclerosis. The results well matched the pathological analysis, indicating that PCA-tdTHz is a quick, powerful, evolving tool for identification and evaluation myelin deficit in preclinical animals and potentially in para-clinical human biopsy.