Ultra-broadband Polarisers Based on Metastable Free-Standing Aligned Carbon Nanotube Membranes

Abstract

A carbon nanotube free-standing linearly dichroic polariser is developed using solid-state extrusion. Membrane cohesion is experimentally and numerically demonstrated to derive from inter-tube van der Waals interactions in this family of planar metastable morphologies, controlled by the chemical vapour deposition conditions. Ultra-broadband polarisation (400 nm – 2.5 mm) is shown and corroborated by effective medium and full numerical simulations.This work was supported by the Isaac Newton Trust, Trinity College Cambridge University. M. T. Cole thanks the Winston Churchill Memorial Trust and the Oppenheimer Research Fellowship, Cambridge University, for generous financial support.This is the author accepted manuscript. The final version is available from Wiley at http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/adom.201400238/abstract