The properties of photon tunnelling in a frustrated total internal reflection structure with an indefinite metamaterial slab

摘要

The tunnelling time and lateral shift of photon tunnelling through the frustrated total internal reflection structure containing indefinite metamaterials are obtained by employing the stationary-phase approximation. It is found that the photon tunnelling only occurs when the barrier is thin enough. For the indefinite metamaterial with one-sheet hyperbolic dispersion, the anomalous total reflection occurs, and the negative lateral shift and tunnelling time can be obtained. The negative tunnelling time indicates that superluminal propagation could be observed when a photon tunnels through the indefinite metamaterial. Both lateral shift and tunnelling time tend to a saturation value, respectively, as the barrier thickness increases. Moreover, the dependence of properties of four kinds of indefinite metamaterial on the thickness, the permittivity and permeability tensors is discussed.