Unlocking the Power of Light With Advanced Metasurfaces for High-Speed Wireless Communication

Caltech engineers have introduced an innovative metasurface that manipulates light to provide multiple communication channels at optical frequencies.

This technology promises to enhance data transmission in various fields including space communications and LiDAR, moving beyond traditional electronic methods and offering substantial bandwidth improvements.

Revolutionizing Wireless Communication With Metasurfaces
It is a scene many of us are familiar with: You’re working on your laptop at the local coffee shop with maybe a half dozen other laptop users—each of you is trying to load websites or stream high-definition videos, and all are craving more bandwidth. Now imagine that each of you had a dedicated wireless channel for communication that was hundreds of times faster than the Wi-Fi we use today, with hundreds of times more bandwidth. That dream may not be far off thanks to the development of metasurfaces—tiny engineered sheets that can reflect and otherwise direct light in desired ways.