The conventional metasurface remains functionally inflexible, as their platform are typically optimized and designed for specific scenarios, necessitating a complete redesign when operational parameters and function change-a process that incurs significant time and costs. To overcome the fundamental limitation, we propose a hierarchical reconfigurable metasurface architecture (HRMA) to achieve comprehensive electromagnetic parameter modulation and on-demand polymorphic function switching. The reconfigurable metasurface is divided into a programmable core (PC) and scenario-guided functional modules (FMs). The PC differs from traditional switches in terms of structure, performance, and manner of use, exhibiting significant flexibility and reusability. The low-cost FM is attached to the PC, protecting it and endowing the metasurface with specific functional requirements. Based on this architecture, we achieve polymorphic functionality, effectuate extreme bandwidth coverage, and verify the possibility of comprehensive electromagnetic parameter regulation through a single hardware platform. This architecture provides a solution to orchestrate polymorphic scattering in diverse scenarios, offering a scalable design paradigm for next-generation reconfigurable microwave devices and systems.
Zhu et al. (2026) studied this question.