Demonstration of dispersive rarefaction shocks in hollow elliptical cylinder chains

We report an experimental and numerical demonstration of dispersive rarefaction shocks (DRS) in a 3D-printed soft chain of hollow elliptical cylinders. We find that, in contrast to conventional nonlinear waves, these DRS have their lower amplitude components travel faster, while the higher amplitude ones propagate slower. This results in the backward-tilted shape of the front of the wave (the rarefaction segment) and the breakage of wave tails into a modulated waveform (the dispersive shock segment). Examining the DRS under various impact conditions, we find the counter-intuitive feature that the higher striker velocity causes the slower propagation of the DRS. These unique features can be useful for mitigating impact controllably and efficiently without relying on material damping or plasticity effects

Subwavelength localization and toroidal dipole moment of spoof surface plasmon polaritons

We experimentally and theoretically demonstrate subwavelength scale localization of spoof surface plasmon polaritons at a point defect in a two-dimensional groove metal array. An analytical expression for dispersion relation of spoof surface plasmon polaritons substantiates the existence of a band gap where a defect mode can be introduced. A waveguide coupling method allows us to excite localized spoof surface plasmon polariton modes and measure their resonance frequencies. Numerical calculations confirm that localized modes can have a very small modal volume and a high Q factor both of which are essential in enhancing light-matter interactions. Interestingly, we find that the localized spoof surface plasmon polariton has a significant toroidal dipole moment, which is responsible for the high Q factor, as well as an electric quadrupole moment. In addition, the dispersion properties of spoof surface plasmon polaritons are analyzed using a modal expansion method and numerical calculations