Loss compensation schemes to compensate for losses in metal-dieletric structures

An interesting paper appeared 2 weeks ago in Phys. Rev. A :

M. A. Vincenti et al. Loss compensation in metal-dielectric structures in negative-refraction and super-resolving regimes, Phys. Rev. A 80, 053807 (2009). [...]

The authors show that the introduction of gain improves the resolving characteristics of the lens and leads to gain-tunable super-resolution.

The metamaterials which are made up of metallic elements are extremely sensitive to loss. Studies such as those are crucial, before even thinking about practical applications.

We also submitted a related study entitled "Storing light in active optical waveguides with single-negative metamaterials" and eagerly awaiting its publication!