Planar negative refractive index media using periodically L-C loaded transmission lines

Recent demonstrations of negative refraction utilize three-dimensional collections of discrete periodic scatterers to synthesize artificial dielectrics with simultaneously negative permittivity and permeability. In this paper, we propose an alternate perspective on the design and function of such materials that exploits the well-known L-C distributed network representation of homogeneous dielectrics. In the conventional low-pass topology, the quantities L and C represent a positive equivalent permeability and permittivity, respectively. However, in the dual configuration, in which the positions of L and C are simply interchanged, these equivalent material parameters assume simultaneously negative values.…