Researchers from China, Singapore, and the UK have successfully created toroidal electromagnetic pulses using a horn microwave antenna, dubbed a “vortex cannon.” These doughnut-shaped structures can be used to encode information or study light-matter interactions. The team led by Ren Wang and Yijie Shen employed wideband, radially polarized conical coaxial horn antennas operating between 1.3-10 GHz to generate rotating electromagnetic wave structures.
The antenna’s design allows it to emit an instantaneous voltage difference that forms stable vortex rings over time and distances. These toroidal pulses contain complex features like skyrmions, which are made up of numerous electric field vectors resembling two-dimensional whirls.
The researchers mapped the spatial electromagnetic fields at different propagation distances using a planar microwave anechoic chamber and vector network analyzer. They found that the pulses evolved over time to resemble canonical Hellwarth-Nouchi toroidal pulses.
Toroidal pulses have applications in cell phone technology, telecommunications, and global positioning. Understanding their dynamics and topological structure is crucial for developing these applications. The study’s findings could lead to breakthroughs in wireless communication, sensing, detection, and metrology systems.
The researchers plan to focus on two areas: developing communication systems based on toroidal pulses and generating higher-order supertoroidal pulses with unique characteristics like propagation invariance and electromagnetic vortex streets. These advancements have the potential to drive groundbreaking applications across various fields, including defense systems or space exploration.
Source: https://physicsworld.com/a/vortex-cannon-generates-toroidal-electromagnetic-pulses/