Simultaneous Spectrum and Polarization Detection Based on a Single Metasurface

Abstract

Simultaneously detecting multidimensional information on light is highly desired in areas such as remote sensing, biomedicine, and manufacturing. The detected spectrum and polarization characteristics can reveal hidden information in intensity-only images. However, traditional methods for detecting the spectrum and polarization of light suffer from cumbersome setups and limited time resolution. Here, we demonstrate a metasurface with the capability of simultaneously detecting the spectrum and polarization of the input light. A set of optimized phase profiles is encoded to the orthogonal polarization channels of the metasurface, leading to the generation of 2 × 2 diffraction orders with specified polarization states. Due to the inherent dispersive nature of the metasurface, the spectrum of incident light can be reconstructed after calibrating the relation between diffraction angles and incident wavelengths. The reconstructed spectra are consistent with the results obtained from a commercial spectrometer with an average fidelity of 88.64% in the working range of 690–830 nm. Meanwhile, the demonstrated metasurface can be utilized in a reverse configuration and implement broadband parallel polarization analysis by exploiting the generated diffraction orders. The average deviations of the orientation angle and elliptical angle between measured and target values are 1.689° and 1.399°, respectively, which exhibit good performance in broadband polarization detection. Our demonstrated method provides a feasible way for simultaneously detecting the spectrum and polarization of input light and may be used for integrating with a CCD camera for achieving multidimensional optical field detection and imaging.