Enlarged omnidirectional photonic gap in one dimensional ternary plasma photonic crystals that contain metamaterials

In contrast to most of the previous work that has been devoted to the enlargement of omnidirectional band gap (OBG) originating from Bragg scattering, we address the enlargement of zero-effective-phase (zero-φ) gap arising in one dimensional photonic crystals (1DPCs) that contain alternating single negative materials. In this article, we propose a new structure termed ternary plasma PCs (TPPCs) by introducing a thin un-magnetized plasma layer between the two single negative materials in each period. The influences of plasma thickness, plasma frequency and collision frequency on the gap width are discussed. Numerical results show that TPPCs structure has wider OBG than that of the corresponding binary PCs. Moreover, the gap width can be continually enlarged by tuning the plasma layer parameters. The proposed structure promises to improve filters, switches and other devices in the microwave range.