Research Article

Liquid crystal integrated metalens with

tunable chromatic aberration
Zhixiong Shen,a,b Shenghang Zhou,a Xinan Li,a Shijun Ge,a,b Peng Chen,a,b Wei Hu,a,b,* and Yanqing Lua,*
a
Nanjing University, College of Engineering and Applied Sciences, National Laboratory of Solid State Microstructures, Key Laboratory of
Intelligent Optical Sensing and Manipulation, Collaborative Innovation Center of Advanced Microstructures, Nanjing, China
b
Jiangsu Industrial Technology Research Institute, Institute for Smart Liquid Crystals, Changshu, China

Abstract. Overcoming chromatic aberrations is a vital concern in imaging systems in order to facilitate full-
color and hyperspectral imaging. By contrast, large dispersion holds opportunities for spectroscopy and
tomography. Combining both functions into a single component will significantly enhance its versatility.
A strategy is proposed to delicately integrate two lenses with a static resonant phase and a switchable
geometric phase separately. The former is a metasurface lens with a linear phase dispersion. The latter is
composed of liquid crystals (LCs) with space-variant orientations with a phase profile that is frequency
independent. By this means, a broadband achromatic focusing from 0.9 to 1.4 THz is revealed. When
a saturated bias is applied on LCs, the geometric phase modulation vanishes, leaving only the resonant
phase of the metalens. Correspondingly, the device changes from achromatic to dispersive. Furthermore,
a metadeflector with tunable dispersion is demonstrated to verify the universality of the proposed method.
Our work may pave a way toward active metaoptics, promoting various imaging applications.
Keywords: active metalens; liquid crystals; chromatic aberration; imaging; terahertz.
Received Apr. 3, 2020; revised manuscript received Apr. 28, 2020; accepted for publication Apr. 29, 2020; published online
May 12, 2020.
© The Authors. Published by SPIE and CLP under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 Unported License. Distribution or
reproduction of this work in whole or in part requires full attribution of the original publication, including its DOI.
[DOI: 10.1117/[Link].2.3.036002]

1 Introduction tuning range. Until now, dynamic functions, especially contin-

uously variable focal length or tunable chromatic aberration,
The development of nanostructured metasurfaces has offered have remained formidable challenges.
unprecedented capabilities for the advance of planar optics.1–3 In many cases, metalenses suffer from large chromatic aber-
Among various metadevices, the metalens attracts widespread rations, which severely degrade the resolution of full-color
attention due to practical applications in imaging and spectros-
and hyperspectral imaging. Compared with optical or near-IR
copy.4–7 Recently, metalenses composed of specific subwave-
metalenses, the chromatic aberration of their terahertz (THz)
length metallic or dielectric resonator arrays have been
counterparts is more significant, due to the broadband of THz
developed for multifunctional wavefront manipulations,8–12
replacing the traditional refractive lenses made of precisely spectrum.22 It induces a frequency-varying focal length and
polished crystals or polymers. These metalenses embrace the drastically degrades the resolution of spectral-resolved THz
trend of miniaturization and integration of photonic systems. imaging.23,24 To solve this problem, mechanical scanning along
Nevertheless, their functions remain static once they are fabri- the optical path is required to capture images at different
cated. Therefore, many researchers are focusing on realizing frequencies,25 which makes the detection and analysis compli-
active metalenses via introducing MEMS,13 semiconductors,14,15 cated and time-consuming. More recently, inspired by achro-
phase-change materials,16–18 graphene,19 and liquid crystals matic metalens designs in the visible and near-IR range,26–30
(LCs)20,21 with external field induced responsivity. The majority broadband achromatic focusing has been realized in the THz
of them possess either switchable bifocal properties or a limited regime via dispersive phase compensation from C-shape silicon
micropillar arrays.31 By contrast, for spectrographic and tomo-
*Address all correspondence to Wei Hu, E-mail: huwei@[Link]; Yanqing Lu, graphic applications,32,33 large chromatism is favored to separate
E-mail: yqlu@[Link] focal spots of different frequencies spatially without crosstalk.34,35

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 Shen et al.: Liquid crystal integrated metalens with tunable chromatic aberration

If dynamic alternation between the achromatic and dispersive out the applied voltage, it works as a broadband achromatic lens,
focusing properties can be achieved using a single metalens, where light within the designed spectrum deflects to the same
it would greatly promote the practical applications of spectros- focal spot. When applying a saturated bias on the graphene
copy and imaging systems. electrodes39 covered on both sides of the LC layer, LCs are
In this paper, we propose a transmission-type THz metalens reoriented perpendicularly to the substrates. Thus the φG
with tunable chromatic aberration. The metalens integrates a modulation vanishes and only the φR of the metaunits works.
dielectric metasurface with photopatterned LCs and exhibits Correspondingly, the device turns into a chromatic lens with
a broadband achromatism. When a saturated voltage is applied an anomalous dispersion, i.e., the focal length decreases when
on the transparent graphene electrodes, a dispersive focusing the frequency increases.
function is revealed. The performance of the metalens is char- The generalized phase profile of an achromatic lens is ex-
acterized and consistent with numerical simulations. Further, pressed as
THz imaging performed with this metalens also verifies its tun-


able functions. This approach may open an avenue for designing 2πf pffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi
ffi
active metalenses in versatile applications. φA ðf; rÞ ¼ − F2 þ r2 − F þ ΔφðfÞ; (1)
c

2 Results where f denotes the working frequency, c is the light velocity in

vacuum, F is the focal length, and r is the radius of an arbitrary
2.1 Principle and Design point on the lens. The additional phase Δφ is only related to f,
which is introduced for dispersion compensation (see Fig. S1 in
Figures 1(a) and 1(b) schematically illustrate the tunable func-
the Supplementary Material). If a linear function is established
tions of the proposed metalens. The achromatism is accom-
between Δφ and f, namely, Δφ ¼ kf þ d (k and d are con-
plished by delicately designing the integrated resonant phase
stants), φA can be transformed to
(φR ) and geometric phase (φG ). Geometries of silicon pillar meta-
units36,37 vary from the center to the edge, enabling a frequency- 

2π pffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi
ffi
dependent lens phase profile. The space-variant alignments of φA ðf; rÞ ¼ k − F þ r − F f þ d:
2 2 (2)
LCs38 perform a frequency-independent φG modulation. With- c

Fig. 1 Schematic function tunability and designs of the metalens. (a) The broadband achromatic
focusing state without bias. (b) The dispersive focusing state with a saturated bias. The super-
strate depicts the dielectric metasurface while the blue ellipsoids between the superstrate and
substrate denote LCs. (c) Dependencies of φR (red curve) and PCR of a silicon pillar metaunit
on f . Inset shows the dimensions of the unit. Dependency of φR on l and w at (d) 0.9 and
(e) 1.4 THz, respectively. (f) Dispersion ratio of the silicon pillar as a function of l and w under
LCP incidence. Dependency of PCR on l and w at (g) 0.9 and (h) 1.4 THz. The region circled by
the black dashed line indicates a PCR over 12% from 0.9 to 1.4 THz. (i) Designed l and w of the
silicon pillars along r from the center to the edge. (j) φA and φR at 0.9 (blue solid and dashed
curves) and 1.4 THz (red solid and dashed curves) and residual φG . (k) Target φG and correspond-
ing LC director distributions are labeled by the orange lines.

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 Shen et al.: Liquid crystal integrated metalens with tunable chromatic aberration

From Eq. (2), at a certain r, the required φA shows a linear considered to maintain a lens profile. Figures 1(g) and 1(h)
relationship with f. Such a linear dispersion can be satisfied by exhibit the dependency of PCR on l and w. For optimized
high-order waveguide resonances excited inside the dielectric efficiency, only parameters in the black-dashed region are
pillars with a high aspect ratio and large dielectric constant40 used. Due to the limited range of dφR ∕df (41.8 rad∕THz
(Fig. S2 in the Supplementary Material). Apart from the former at l ¼ 48 μm, w ¼ 10 μm to 49.5 rad∕THz at l ¼ 50 μm,
dispersion item achieved by the φR , the constant d is frequency- w ¼ 44 μm), r of the metalens is limited to 3240 μm, i.e.,
independent and can be accomplished through introducing the 54 units. According to this design, the l and w of the silicon
φG , namely the Pancharatnam–Berry phase.41 It originates from pillars along r are presented in Fig. 1(i). It is observed that
the photonic spin–orbit interaction and can be created via con- l remains nearly unchanged around 50 μm, whereas w gradually
trolling the geometric orientation angle θ of anisotropic media, decreases from the center to the edge. Figure 1(j) plots the
e.g., LCs and metaresonators.42,43 Theoretically, φG is twice θ φR and φA at 0.9 and 1.4 THz. The f-independent and
and conjugated at left-handed and right-handed circular polari- r-dependent gap between φA and φR can be compensated for
zation (LCP/RCP) incidences. by φG. The corresponding φG profile [Fig. 1(k)] can be precisely
As a proof-of-concept demonstration, an achromatic lens with accomplished by locally varying the LC directors, as shown
F ¼ 15.0 mm from 0.9 to 1.4 THz was designed. In Fig. 1(c), schematically in the overlay.
φR and the polarization conversion ratio (PCR, determining
the efficiency of the metalens) of a silicon pillar metaunit
2.2 Focusing Performance Characterizations
with l ¼ 50 μm, w ¼ 36 μm, h ¼ 200 μm, and p ¼ 60 μm are
simulated and presented as an example. To simplify the simu- Figures 2(a)–2(d) present the SEM images of the fabricated
lation, we fix h and p and then vary l and w in the range of metasurface. Figure 2(a) shows a part of the metasurface from
10 to 50 μm to achieve a library of dispersion ratios (defined the top view. The silicon pillars close to the center and the edge
as dφR ∕df), as shown in Fig. 1(f). dφR ∕df increases with l are labeled by orange and blue dashed squares, respectively.
and w separately. The abnormal values along the diagonal Corresponding zoomed-in images in Figs. 2(b) and 2(c) show
are due to the near zero PCR when l ¼ w. φR and PCR are also well-defined microstructures, which faithfully follow the design
related to l and w; the dependencies of φR on them at 0.9 and [Fig. 1(i)]. The cross-section image of the metasurface is exhib-
1.4 THz are shown in Figs. 1(d) and 1(e), respectively. The ited in Fig. 2(d). Some broken pillars resulting from the damage
π phase difference of φR on mirrored sides of l ¼ w is due to caused in the cutting process are observed. Due to the different
the additional φG induced by a 90-deg rotation of the metaunit. etching speeds for the varying aspect ratio in the fabrication,
To achieve the desired achromatic property, the geometry of pillars near the edge [the right side in Fig. 2(d)] are higher than
metaunits at different r should be deliberately selected. In those near the center (left side) (detailed in Fig. S3 in the
addition to the dispersion factor dφR ∕df, φR should be further Supplementary Material). The photopatterned LCs are observed

Fig. 2 Characterization of the metalens. (a) SEM image of the metasurface (top view). Scale bar:
300 μm. Zoomed-in images of the silicon pillars labeled by the (b) orange and (c) blue squares in
(a), respectively. (d) Cross-section image of the metasurface. Scale bars in (b)–(d): 100 μm.
(e) Optical image of the LC layer under crossed polarizers. (f) A zoomed-in image labeled by
the orange square in (e). Scale bars in (e) and (f) are 1 mm and 500 μm, respectively.

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 Shen et al.: Liquid crystal integrated metalens with tunable chromatic aberration

Fig. 3 Focusing performance of the metalens. (a) Simulated THz fields in the x z plane and
(b) measured THz fields in the x z and x y plane (z ¼ 12.0 mm) at 0.9, 1.1, and 1.4 THz, respec-
tively, when no bias is applied. (c) Simulated and (d) measured THz fields in the x z and x y plane
(z ¼ 13.0 mm) of the same sample with a saturated bias. Dashed lines in (a)–(d) label the cor-
responding focal planes. White curves in (b) and (d) depict the transverse intensity distributions
at z ¼ 12.0 and 13.0 mm, respectively. (e) Simulated and measured F , (f) FWHM at z ¼ 12.0
and 13.0 mm in (b) and (d), separately, and (g) measured device efficiency, as a function of f .
The black dashed line in (f) depicts the diffraction-limited FWHM.

under the microscope with crossed polarizers. The optical image the simulation. After a square-wave alternating voltage (75 V rms ,
of the whole LC region is displayed in Fig. 2(e), in which the 1 kHz) is applied, both the simulated and measured results
gray scales are consistent with the φG shown in Fig. 1(k). As the [Figs. 3(c) and 3(d)] show a significant F dispersion among
φG is pixelated with the same periodicity of 60 μm as that of different f from 0.9 to 1.4 THz. It is noticed that, as the φG
silicon metaunits, gray scale pixels are vividly revealed in the is spin-dependent, the metalens only works at the LCP THz
zoomed-in image in Fig. 2(f). incidence when the bias is OFF, whereas it works at both
We use a scanning near-field THz microscope (SNTM) to LCP/RCP incidences when the bias is saturated due to the spin-
characterize the performance of the LC integrated metalens. independent φR . LCs can be electrically tuned to match the
The normalized intensity distributions from 0.9 to 1.4 THz half-wave conditions at different f to generate a complete geo-
with an interval of 0.1 THz are simulated and measured at metric phase modulation, contributing to the achromatic case.
the bias OFF and saturated states, respectively (Fig. S4 in the Mismatch from the half-wave condition causes the residual
Supplementary Material). Figure 3(a) selectively reveals the unmodulated wave, contributing to the dispersive case. Thus via
simulated THz fields at 0.9, 1.1, and 1.4 THz in the xz plane at tuning the applied voltage, the required circular polarization
bias OFF. The measured F remains unchanged around 12.0 mm incidence of the metasurface is satisfied.
within the designed spectrum [Fig. 3(b)], which is consistent The dependencies of F on f at both the bias OFF and satu-
with the simulation. Little distortions are observed at 0.9 and rated states are quantified in Fig. 3(e). The results satisfactorily
1.1 THz, which is mainly attributed to the slightly tilt incidence verify the function tunability from achromatic to dispersive.
of the THz beam. The THz fields in the xy plane (z ¼ 12.0 mm) Full-widths at half-maximum (FWHMs) of the intensity profile
and the corresponding transverse intensity profiles are also at different f are shown in Fig. 3(f). The values at the achromatic
exhibited, verifying the perfect achromatic focusing property. state [z ¼ 12.0 mm in Fig. 3(b)] are very close to the ideal
It is noticed that the F is slightly smaller than the design as a diffraction limit (λ∕2 NA), whereas distinct deviations are ob-
result of the gradual etching depth deviation (see Sec. S2 in the served at the dispersive state [z ¼ 13.0 mm in Fig. 3(d)] due to
Supplementary Material). This deviation is also considered in the defocusing at lower f. Figure 3(g) exhibits the measured

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 Shen et al.: Liquid crystal integrated metalens with tunable chromatic aberration

efficiency, which is defined as the ratio of THz intensity at the After generation with a photoconductive antenna,44 the linearly
focal plane to the incident LCP THz power. The average effi- polarized THz wave is converted to LCP with a quarter-wave
ciency of the dispersive case (∼33.9%) is higher than that of the plate. The THz beam transmits the object and subsequently
achromatic one (∼26.1%), which is attributed to the additional the metalens; then it is scanned by the probe. The object is a
PCR loss caused by LCs. The total efficiency is determined by “smiling face” with a diffraction-limited resolution. The object
several factors: the PCR of the metaunits and LCs, the absorp- distance u and image distance v are designed as both 24.0 mm
tion and scattering of all transmitted layers, and the imperfect to obtain an image with an equal size of the object when
fabrication of the sample. These issues can be addressed by F ¼ 12.0 mm. The intensity and phase distributions from
further optimizing the metaunit geometry and the LC layer 0.9 to 1.4 THz with an interval of 0.1 THz are measured at the
thickness and introducing low-loss substrates (detailed analysis bias OFF and saturated states (Fig. S5 in the Supplementary
in Sec. S4 in the Supplementary Material). Material). At the bias OFF state, a multispectral imaging is real-
ized, where the smiling face can be distinctly observed at any f
2.3 Dynamic THz Imaging within the spectrum. When the bias is saturated, the imaging
quality becomes poorer at lower f due to the deviation of F from
The imaging performance of the metalens is further character- 12.0 mm. Figures 4(b)–4(e) show the corresponding intensity
ized, utilizing the setup schematically illustrated in Fig. 4(a). and phase distributions at 0.9 and 1.4 THz. The transverse

Fig. 4 Broadband THz imaging. (a) Schematic of the SNTM setup. The inset exhibits the micro-
graph of the object “smiling face,” where the scale bar indicates 1 mm. Measured intensity and
phase distributions at (b) 0.9 and (c) 1.4 THz without bias. The white and orange curves depict the
intensity profiles along the white and orange dashed lines, respectively. The outline of the object
“smiling face” is labeled by black dashed lines in the phase diagrams. Measured intensity and
phase distributions at (d) 0.9 and (e) 1.4 THz with a saturated bias.

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 Shen et al.: Liquid crystal integrated metalens with tunable chromatic aberration

intensities across two “eyes” and the “mouth” are clearly rec- 3.3 Characterizations
ognized in Figs. 4(b), 4(c), and 4(e), indicating a satisfactory
imaging quality. The smiling face is distinguishable in corre- An SNTM setup (Terahertz Photonics Co., Ltd., China), which
sponding phase distributions as well. However, the imaging is based on the photoconductive THz generation and detection,
effect is poor in Fig. 4(d) due to the remarkable defocusing. is utilized to characterize the performance of the metalens. In the
The imaging quality can be further enhanced via enlarging setup, a scanning tip fixed on a motorized stage [Fig. 4(a)] is
the NA of the metalens. A simple and effective method is in- utilized to record the Ex field in the xy plane with a step size
creasing the h of the silicon pillars while maintaining the other of 0.25 mm. The sample moves along the z axis with a step size
parameters (see Fig. S6 in the Supplementary Material). of 1 mm to capture the Ex field in the xz plane. Then an inter-
polation algorithm is adopted to obtain the measured THz fields.

2.4 Active Metadeflector

4 Conclusion
The proposed strategy can be rationally extended to the design We developed an LC integrated metalens with tunable chromatic
of various active metadevices beyond the metalens. We numeri- aberration. The geometric phase of photopatterned LCs and the
cally demonstrate a beam deflector with tunable dispersion in resonant phase of the dielectric metasurface together contribute
Fig. S8. It is composed of silicon metaunits with geometries to the broadband achromatic focusing. While applying a satu-
varying along the x axis and LCs with gradient orientation dis- rated voltage to LCs, the geometric phase modulation vanishes
tributions. The combination of φR and φG contributes to a fixed and the metalens exhibits a dispersive focusing. Simulated and
deflection angle of 17 deg from 0.9 to 1.4 THz. When the LCs experimental results of such active functions reveal a good con-
are reoriented along the z axis, the deflection becomes disper- sistency. Moreover, multispectral THz imaging using this metal-
sive (details in Sec. S5 in the Supplementary Material). ens is demonstrated, indicating great potential in advanced THz
spectroscopy and imaging apparatuses. This strategy can also
3 Experimental Section be extended to other electromagnetic spectra, e.g., the visible
and near-IR, where lenses with integrated tunable functions are
3.1 Sample Fabrication highly desired for full-color imaging and tomography. A meta-
deflector with tunable dispersion is further demonstrated, which
The fabrication process of the LC integrated metalens is sche- verifies the versatility of the proposed solution for various meta-
matically illustrated in Fig. S9 in the Supplementary Material. devices toward active metaoptics.
The metasurface is fabricated via the standard photolithography
process followed by a reactive ion etching on a 500-μm-thick Acknowledgments
intrinsic silicon wafer. Then the residual photoresist is lifted off.
Both the metasurface and silica substrate are ultrasonically The authors gratefully acknowledge the support of the
cleaned and O-plasma treated for 10 min. Then they are trans- National Key Research and Development Program of China
ferred with few-layer graphene from copper foil (Six Carbon (No. 2017YFA0303700), the National Natural Science Founda-
Technology, China). After that, they are spin-coated at 3000 rpm tion of China (NSFC) (No. 61922038), the Distinguished Young
for 30 s with photoalignment agent SD145,46 (Dai-Nippon Ink Scholars Fund of Jiangsu Province (No. BK20180004), and
and Chemicals, Japan) and baked at 100°C for 10 min to remove the Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities
the solvent. Then the metasurface and silica substrate are as- (No. 021014380118). W. H. gratefully acknowledges the sup-
sembled with a 250-μm-thick Mylar spacer to form a cell. A port of the Tang Scholar Program. The authors declare no con-
digital micromirror device-based dynamic microlithography47,48 flicts of interest.
is employed to perform the photopatterning process. Then the
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27. Z. B. Fan et al., “A broadband achromatic metalens array for Zhixiong Shen received his BEng degree in material physics from
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28. S. Wang et al., “A broadband achromatic metalens in the visible,” student at the College of Engineering and Applied Sciences, Nanjing
Nat. Nanotechnol. 13, 227–232 (2018). University. His research interests include liquid crystal terahertz modula-
29. S. M. Wang et al., “Broadband achromatic optical metasurface tors and tunable metamaterials.
devices,” Nat. Commun. 8, 187 (2017).
30. R. J. Lin et al., “Achromatic metalens array for full-colour light- Wei Hu received his PhD from Jilin University, Changchun, China, in
field imaging,” Nat. Nanotechnol. 14(3), 227–231 (2019). 2009. Currently, he is a professor at the College of Engineering and
31. Q. Cheng et al., “Broadband achromatic metalens in terahertz Applied Sciences, Nanjing University. His research interests include
regime,” Sci. Bull. 64(20), 1525–1531 (2019). liquid crystal materials and optical devices.
32. M. Naftaly and R. E. Miles, “Terahertz time-domain spectroscopy
for material characterization,” Proc. IEEE 95(8), 1658–1665 (2007).
Yanqing Lu received his PhD from Nanjing University, Nanjing, China, in
33. B. Ferguson et al., “T-ray computed tomography,” Opt. Lett.
1996. Currently, he is a professor at the College of Engineering and
27(15), 1312–1314 (2002).
34. X. Ni et al., “Ultra-thin, planar, Babinet-inverted plasmonic meta- Applied Sciences, Nanjing University. His research interests include non-
lenses,” Light Sci. Appl. 2, e72 (2013). linear and quantum photonics and liquid crystal devices.
35. C. Chen et al., “Spectral tomographic imaging with aplanatic
metalens,” Light Sci. Appl. 8, 99 (2019). Biographies of the other authors are not available.

Advanced Photonics 036002-7 May∕Jun 2020 • Vol. 2(3)