ABSTRACT Birefringence, from the very essence of the word itself, refers to the splitting of light rays into two parts. In natural birefringent materials, this splitting is a beautiful

phenomenon, resulting in the perception of a double image. In optical metamaterials, birefringence is often an unwanted side effect of forcing a device designed through transformation

optics1,2,3,4,5,6 to operate in dielectrics. One polarization is usually implemented in dielectrics, and the other is sacrificed7,8. Here we show, with techniques beyond transformation

optics, that this need not be the case, that both polarizations can be controlled to perform useful tasks in dielectrics, and that rays, at all incident angles, can even follow different

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* Learn about institutional subscriptions * Read our FAQs * Contact customer support SIMILAR CONTENT BEING VIEWED BY OTHERS PTYCHOGRAPHIC LENS-LESS BIREFRINGENCE MICROSCOPY USING A

MASK-MODULATED POLARIZATION IMAGE SENSOR Article Open access 07 November 2023 FLAT OPTICS WITH DISPERSION-ENGINEERED METASURFACES Article 19 June 2020 MONOLITHIC FOCUS-TUNABLE LENS

TECHNOLOGY ENABLED BY DISK-TYPE DIELECTRIC-ELASTOMER ACTUATORS Article Open access 09 October 2020 REFERENCES * Service, R. F. & Cho, A. Strange new tricks with light. _Science_ 330,

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references ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS The authors acknowledge funding from the Singapore Ministy of Education Tier II Academic Research Fund (grant no. MOE2009-T2-1-086). U.L. was supported by the

Royal Society. T.T. acknowledges grants nos MSM0021622409 and MSM0021622419 from the Czech Ministry of Education. AUTHOR INFORMATION AUTHORS AND AFFILIATIONS * Department of Electrical and

Computer Engineering, National University of Singapore, Singapore, 117576 Aaron J. Danner * Faculty of Science and Faculty of Informatics, Masaryk University, Brno, 61137, Czech Republic

Tomáš Tyc * School of Physics and Astronomy, University of St Andrews, North Haugh, St Andrews, KY16 9SS, UK Ulf Leonhardt Authors * Aaron J. Danner View author publications You can also

search for this author inPubMed Google Scholar * Tomáš Tyc View author publications You can also search for this author inPubMed Google Scholar * Ulf Leonhardt View author publications You

can also search for this author inPubMed Google Scholar CONTRIBUTIONS A.D. devised the main theory presented in the text and created ray-traced images. T.T. contributed to designing the

interior focusing and multifocal length lenses. U.L. proposed the original problem and contributed to potential applications of the theory. CORRESPONDING AUTHOR Correspondence to Aaron J.

Danner. ETHICS DECLARATIONS COMPETING INTERESTS The authors declare no competing financial interests. SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION (PDF 1157 KB) RIGHTS AND PERMISSIONS

Reprints and permissions ABOUT THIS ARTICLE CITE THIS ARTICLE Danner, A., Tyc, T. & Leonhardt, U. Controlling birefringence in dielectrics. _Nature Photon_ 5, 357–359 (2011).

https://doi.org/10.1038/nphoton.2011.53 Download citation * Received: 11 October 2010 * Accepted: 24 March 2011 * Published: 08 May 2011 * Issue Date: June 2011 * DOI:

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