Surface Wave Dispersion for a Tunable Grounded Liquid Crystal Substrate Without and With Metasurface on Top

The surface wave dispersion of a grounded layer of liquid crystals (LCs) is investigated by taking into account the inherent electrical reconfigurability of such a material. The spectral dyadic impedance Green's function of the tunable LC grounded slab is calculated and the dispersion curve of the fundamental mode supported by the structure is presented, showing that the orientation of the optical axis of the LCs modifies the surface wave dispersion curve significantly enough to be applied for surface wave propagation control. Furthermore, it is demonstrated that the presence of an inductive metasurface on top of the LC layer impressively reduces the resonance frequency and increases the sensitivity to the continuous voltage biasing.