The manipulation and application of electromagnetic wave and information has become an important part of our daily life, and the intelligent element surface has emerged as an intelligent platform to automatically control the wave information matter interaction without manual intervention. They evolved from engineering composites, including metamaterials and super surfaces. We have seen significant progress in the development of metamaterials and Hypersurfaces in various forms and properties in the science and technology industry.
In a paper published in the Journal elight on May 6, 2022, Professor Cui Tiejun of Southeast University and Professor Li lianlin of Peking University led a research team to review the technical progress of intelligent hypersurface. The title of the paper is "intelligent element surface: control, communication and computing", which mainly describes the research on the development of intelligent element surface and focuses on the future.
This field has refreshed human insights into many basic laws, including the development of many novel devices and systems, the possibility of camouflage, tunnel and hologram. Traditional independent structures or passive element surfaces have been developed into intelligent element surfaces by integrating algorithms and nonlinear materials (or active devices).
Intelligent element surface has three key attributes: digitization, programmability and intelligence. They provide an important opportunity to control interactions without human intervention. Digitization enables the meta surface to encode, decode and store digital information. Programmability means that the meta surface can realize different functions with one physical entity. Intelligence means that the intelligent element surface can make decisions, program itself, and perform continuous tasks without human supervision.
Intelligence is the core, and algorithms can play this role well. Artificial intelligence (AI) is developing rapidly, especially in data mining and knowledge discovery. Facts have proved that deep learning plays an extraordinary role in almost all fields of science and engineering. Deep learning has had a significant positive impact on the field of metamaterials and hypersurfaces. There is no doubt that it will give birth to a comprehensive and active research direction.
When evaluating the future of smart hypersurfaces, the wireless signals that already exist in our lives may be crucial to the further development of this field. The development of 6G wireless communication, green Internet of things and digital pairing is where smart element surfaces can benefit.
We can imagine that the intelligent element surface can learn, make decisions, self program, and constantly learn in its "life". Intelligent element surface is a new research direction involving various disciplines. There are many open issues that need to be carefully addressed in the future.
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