MEMS-integrated PDMS metasurface designed for autonomous vehicles sensing: a new approach for LiDAR application

We demonstrate dynamic beam steering by mechanically tuning a flexible 20° beam deflector metasurface made of PDMS. The deflective device is a 2D array consist of resonant sub-wavelength meta atoms operating at 1550 𝑛𝑚. The tuning is obtained by a designated stretching device able to strongly clamp and stretch a flexible metasurface allowing the monitoring and controlling of the applied external strain. Stretching a deflector changes the array geometry which consequently changes the aperture phase function. This results in a continuous change of the deflection angle thus creating a beam scanner. We show the steering range can reach 9.9° with a corresponding stretch ratio of 1.73. These results validates the potential of reconfigurable metasurfaces to yield dynamic beam steering which is an essential building block for both existing and future optical systems.