https://doi.org/10.1140/epjd/s10053-026-01169-0
Research - Photon
Terahertz dual-band absorber and half-adder based on GaAs and VO2 metamaterials
1
Guangxi Key Laboratory of Automatic Detecting Technology and Instruments, Guilin University of Electronic Technology, 541004, Guilin, People’s Republic of China
2
School of Computer Science and Engineering, Northeastern University, 110000, Shenyang, People’s Republic of China
3
Sichuan National Innovation New Vision UHD Video Technology Co, Ltd, 610095, Chengdu, People’s Republic of China
4
Guangxi Key Laboratory of Brain-inspired Computing and Intelligent Chips, Guangxi Normal University, 541004, Guilin, People’s Republic of China
a
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b
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Received:
14
December
2025
Accepted:
13
April
2026
Published online:
28
April
2026
Abstract
Here, for the first time, we have designed a dual-band metamaterial absorber based on the principle of terahertz absorption, using temperature-controlled vanadium dioxide (VO2) and externally pumped gallium arsenide (GaAs) to achieve logic function of a half-adder in the terahertz domain. On one hand, as the power of the external pump light increases, the conductivity of GaAs changes accordingly. On the other hand, due to the insulator-to-metal phase transition (IMT) characteristic of VO2, the conductivity of VO2 can be altered by temperature changes. By adjusting these two materials, we ultimately achieve tunability in the absorption spectrum. Using the states of VO2 and GaAs as the two inputs of the half-adder and encoding them, our designed half-adder can obtain the output results at 1.0214 THz and 1.9616 THz. We simulated and optimized the characteristics of the half-adder using the finite integration time domain (FITD) method and analyzed and compared the device's performance. The half-adder exhibits a maximum modulation depth (MD) of 98.10%, a minimum insertion loss (IL) of 0.36 dB, and a maximum extinction ratio (ER) of 17.22 dB. Additionally, the proposed structure was validated using ADS tools and equivalent circuit (ECM) models. This work offers novel insights for realizing new logic functions in terahertz devices and designing half-adders in the terahertz domain.
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© The Author(s), under exclusive licence to EDP Sciences, SIF and Springer-Verlag GmbH Germany, part of Springer Nature 2026
Springer Nature or its licensor (e.g. a society or other partner) holds exclusive rights to this article under a publishing agreement with the author(s) or other rightsholder(s); author self-archiving of the accepted manuscript version of this article is solely governed by the terms of such publishing agreement and applicable law.
