Giampiero Gerini

Professorship chair

Material engineering form Microwaves to Optics (Eindhoven University of Technology).

Research area

Metamaterials and metasurfaces are artificially engineered structures consisting of arrays of sub-wavelength scatterers embedded or deposited on a host material. While in metamaterials the scatterers alter the host material electrical parameters, realizing values not available in nature, in metasurfaces, the scatterers induce very abrupt variations of the phase, polarization and amplitude of the impinging wave, within a very thin, sub-wavelength membrane. These unconventional electromagnetic properties can lead to major breakthroughs in sensing, imaging and miniaturization. Metasurfaces find applications in a very large frequency spectrum ranging from microwaves, up to infrared and visible.

Optical metasurfaces allow all possible forms of light manipulation with unconventional, extremely thin optical devices, like flat lenses, deflectors, polarizers, holograms, perfect absorbers, filters, beam shapers, near-to-far-field transducers, etcetera. Their extraordinary electromagnetic properties and their extremely thin dimensions allow very high levels of integration with other components and sensors for the realization of unprecedented light processing devices.

Metasurfaces have also very interesting applications at microwaves for defence and commutations. Reconfigurable metasurfaces, for example, thanks to their capability to control the reflection of impinging electromagnetic waves can be used to make defence platforms invisible to radar or to allow good coverage in complex urban environments without resorting to a massive use of power-hungry base stations.

My main research goal in this field is to enable the development of novel system/instrument concepts based on metasurfaces/metamaterials. To accomplish this goal, we develop modelling/design frameworks, we build and test demonstrators and we embed these structures in the design of complex systems. TNO has a long and world recognized competence in the development of instruments/systems for space, defence and semiconductor industry. With the use of metasurfaces and metamaterials we are enabling the development of a new generation of instruments.

In this context, my research closely contributes to the TNO roadmaps ‘Semiconductor’, ‘Space’ and ‘Information & Sensor systems’.

Top publications

• T. Ceccotti, B. Brenny, G. Gerini et al., “Multispectral polarimetric instrument concept based on metasurface filters”, SPIE Remote Sensing Proceedings, Vol. N. 12729, November 2023.
• T. A. W Wolterink, R. D. Buijs, G. Gerini, A. F. Koenderink and E. Verhagen, "Localizing nanoscale objects using nanophotonic near-field transducers" Nanophotonics, vol.10, no.6, 2021.
• C. F. Kenworthy, L. P. Stoevelaar, A. J. Alexander, G. Gerini, “Using the near field optical trapping effect of a dielectric metasurface to improve SERS enhancement for virus detection”, Nature - Scientific Reports 11, 6873 (2021).
• R. Buijs, T. Wolterink, G. Gerini, F. Koenderink, and E. Verhagen, “Information advantage from polarization-multiplexed readout of nanophotonic scattering overlay sensors”, Opt. Express 29, 42900 (2021).
• T. Wolterink, R. Buijs, G. Gerini, E. Verhagen, and F. Koenderink, “Calibration-based overlay sensing with minimal-footprint targets”, Appl. Phys. Lett. 119, 111104 (2021).