A Theoretical Study of Comparison of Graphene, Superconductors and Metals as Conductors for Meta Materials and Plasmonics

Using the theoretical formalism of P Tassin et al. [Nature Photonics, 6, 259 (2012)] and C M Soukoulis et al. [Science 330, 1633 (2010)], we have theoretically studied the comparison of grapheme, superconductors and metals as conductors for meta-materials and plasmonics. We observed the following facts: We observed from the analysis of figureof merit that grapheme and highTC superconductors are not viable alternatives for metals in meta-materials. For Plasmonic systems, our analysis indicate that grapheme and high TCsuperconductors cannot outperform gold as a platform for surface Plasmon polaritons, because grapheme has a smaller propagation length-to wavelength ratio. Since the recent advancement in meta-materials and plasmonics have promised a number of exciting applications particularly at terahertz and optical frequencies this work will be quite useful in this regards. As noble metals used in these photonic structures are not good conductors at high frequencies resulting in significant dissipative loss, these findings will be helpful.