Marcin Stolarek

Asymmetric transmission of terahertz radiation through a double grating

We report on experimental evidence of unidirectional transmission of terahertz waves through a pair of metallic gratings with different periods. The gratings are optimized for a broadband transmission in one direction, accompanied with a high extinction rate in the opposite direction. In contrast to previous studies, we show that the zero-order nonreciprocity cannot be achieved. Nonetheless, we confirm that the structure can be used successfully as an asymmetric filter.

Seamless access to the PL-Grid e-infrastructure using UNICORE middleware

This chapter provides a brief overview of the UNICORE grid middleware and its utilization in the large Distributed Computing Infrastructure. UNICORE framework, in its recent version implements key grid standards and specifications. The system architecture and capabilities, such as security, workflow and data management are described. The installation of the UNICORE environment in the PL-Grid is presented. Special attention is given to the integration of the UNICORE middleware with the PL-Grid authentication and authorization framework which allows for uniform infrastructure and user management across different middlewares. The solutions for monitoring and accounting of the UNICORE infrastructure is presented.

Asymmetric transmission of radially polarized THz radiation through a double circular grating

We report on unidirectional and asymmetric transmission of radially polarized THz radiation through a dual circular metallic grating with sub-wavelength slits. Unidirectional transmission is shown theoretically for a super-Gaussian incident beam, and an asymmetric transmission is demonstrated experimentally, when the radially polarized beam of 0.1 THz is obtained by converting a linearly polarized beam with a discontinuous phase retarder and a tapered waveguide. The dual grating does not include nonlinear materials, its operation is reciprocal, and analogous to that of some planar metallic gratings.

Engineering the point spread function of layered metamaterials

Layered metal-dielectric metamaterials have filtering properties both in the frequency domain and in the spatial frequency domain. Engineering their spatial filtering response is a way of designing structures with specific diffraction properties for such applications as sub-diffraction imaging, supercollimation, or optical signal processing at the nanoscale. In this paper we review the recent progress in this field.We also present a numerical optimization framework for layered metamaterials, based on the use of evolutionary algorithms. A measure of similarity obtained using Hölder’s inequality is adapted to construct the overall criterion function. We analyse the influence of surface roughness on the quality of imaging.

Integrating Slurm Batch System with European and Polish Grid Infrastructures

ICM, one of the major Polish HPC resource providers, migrated to the Slurm batch system as the first site in the PL-Grid and WLCG grid infrastructures. This article describes the Slurm integration issues and the solutions developed. The integration was focused on several areas where grid middleware interacts with the batch scheduling system, additionally taking into consideration the PL-Grid specifics. In particular, the resource usage accounting required a dedicated Slurm support and the scientific grants enforcement policy needed a new implementation. What is more, in this work we present the reasons of the Slurm adoption and other improvements that were necessary to handle the increasing load of the grid site.

Linear sub-diffraction spatial filtering with plasmonic materials

We optimise the transfer function of layered metal-dielectric metamaterials for imaging with sub-wavelength resolution, for high-pass spatial filtering, and for diffraction compensation. A variant of a genetic algorithm is used to optimise the metamaterial. The optimisation criteria include transmission, and reflection coefficients averaged over a range of spatial frequencies, and a measure of similarity between the optimised and desired transfer function. This measure is normalised using the Hölders inequality and is invariant to scaling by a multiplicative complex factor. The overall criterion is a linear combination of these three basic criteria.

Spatial filtering with rough metal-dielectric layered metamaterials

The paper presents the way that colour can serve solving the problem of calibration points indexing in a camera geometrical calibration process. We propose a technique in which indexes of calibration points in a black-and-white chessboard are represented as sets of colour regions in the neighbourhood of calibration points. We provide some general rules for designing a colour calibration chessboard and provide a method of calibration image analysis. We show that this approach leads to obtaining better results than in the case of widely used methods employing information about already indexed points to compute indexes. We also report constraints concerning the technique. Nowadays we are witnessing an increasing need for camera geometrical calibration systems. They are vital for such applications as 3D modelling, 3D reconstruction, assembly control systems, etc. Wherever possible, calibration objects placed in the scene are used in a camera geometrical calibration process. This approach significantly increases accuracy of calibration results and makes the calibration data extraction process easier and universal. There are many geometrical camera calibration techniques for a known calibration scene [1]. A great number of them use as an input calibration points which are localised and indexed in the scene. In this paper we propose the technique of calibration points indexing which uses a colour chessboard. The presented technique was developed by solving problems we encountered during experiments with our earlier methods of camera calibration scene analysis [2]-[3]. In particular, the proposed technique increases the number of indexed points points in case of local lack of calibration points detection. At the beginning of the paper we present a way of designing a chessboard pattern. Then we describe a calibration point indexing method, and finally we show experimental results. A black-and-white chessboard is widely used in order to obtain sub-pixel accuracy of calibration points localisation [1]. Calibration points are defined as corners of chessboard squares. Assuming the availability of rough localisation of these points, the points can be indexed. Noting that differences in distances between neighbouring points in calibration scene images differ slightly, one of the local searching methods can be employed (e.g. [2]). Methods of this type search for a calibration point to be indexed, using a window of a certain size. The position of the window is determined by a vector representing the distance between two previously indexed points in the same row or column. However, experiments show that this approach has its disadvantages, as described below. * E-mail: A.Nowakowski@ire.pw.edu.pl Firstly, there is a danger of omitting some points during indexing in case of local lack of calibration points detection in a neighbourhood (e.g. caused by the presence of non-homogeneous light in the calibration scene). A particularly unfavourable situation is when the local lack of detection effects in the appearance of separated regions of detected calibration points. It is worth saying that such situations are likely to happen for calibration points situated near image borders. Such points are very important for the analysis of optical nonlinearities, and a lack of them can significantly influence the accuracy of distortion modelling. Secondly, such methods may give wrong results in the case of optical distortion with strong nonlinearities when getting information about the neighbouring index is not an easy task. Beside this, the methods are very sensitive to a single false localisation of a calibration point. Such a single false localisation can even result in false indexing of a big set of calibration points. To avoid the above-mentioned problems, we propose using a black-and-white chessboard which contains the coded index of a calibration point in the form of colour squares situated in the nearest neighbourhood of each point. The index of a certain calibration point is determined by colours of four nearest neighbouring squares (Fig.1). An order of squares in such foursome is important. Because the size of a colour square is determined only by the possibility of correct colour detection, the size of a colour square can be smaller than the size of a black or white square. The larger size of a black or white square is determined by the requirements of the exact localisation step which follows the indexing of calibration points [3]. In this step, edge information is extracted from a blackand-white chessboard. This edge information needs larger Artur Nowakowski, Wladyslaw Skarbek Institute of Radioelectronics, Warsaw University of Technology, Nowowiejska 15/19, 00-665 Warszawa, A.Nowakowski@ire.pw.edu.pl Received February 10, 2009; accepted March 27, 2009; published March 31, 2009 http://www.photonics.pl/PLP

Asymmetric transmission of transverse magnetic or radially polarized THZ waves through sub-wavelength gratings

We have developed a metallic double circular grating with sub-wavelength slits which blocks radially polarized light incident from one of its sides and acts as a focusing diffractive element in the other direction. The proposed grating has been optimized for the sub-THz frequency range. Unidirectional transmission through the grating has been demonstrated experimentally at 0.1 THz. We have also developed a planar metallic double grating with sub-wavelength slits which blocks light with a transverse magnetic polarization incident from one of the grating sides and transmits radiation incident from the opposite direction into the +1 and -1 diffraction orders. These gratings which could be used as unidirectional couplers consist of optically linear materials and their operation respects the Lorentz reciprocity theorem.

Perfectly matched layer based multilayer absorbers

Broadband layered absorbers are analysed theoretically and experimentally. A genetic algorithm is used to opti- mize broadband and wide-angle of incidence metal-dielectric layered absorbers. An approximate representation of the perfectly matched layer with a spatially varied absorption strength is discussed. The PML is realised as a stack of uniform and isotropic metamaterial layers with permittivieties and permeabilities given from the effective medium theory. This approximate representation of PML is based on the effective medium theory and we call it an effective medium PML (EM-PML).1 We compare the re ection properties of the layered absorbers to that of a PML material and demonstrate that after neglecting gain and magnetic properties, the absorber remains functional.

Broadband asymmetric transmission of THz radiation through double metallic gratings

We analyse numerically and experimentally the asymmetric transmission through sub-wavelength double metallic gratings. The possibility of achieving a broadband unidirectional transmission of THz waves through the grating is confirmed. The proposed gratings allow for efficient one-way transmission in the wavelength range from 2.5 to 3.5 mm.