Electrical engineering

Physics

Metamaterial antenna

Beamwidth

Energy conversion efficiency

Rectenna

Wireless

Energy harvesting

Slot antenna

Metamaterial

Tunable metamaterials

Engineering

Power (physics)

Antenna (radio)

Materials science

Electronic engineering

Wireless power transfer

Computer science

Quantum mechanics

Cloaking

Directional antenna

Metamaterial absorber

Optoelectronics

Telecommunications

Proceedings of the IEEE

A comprehensive review of metamaterials and metasurfaces for wireless power transfer (WPT) and wireless energy harvesting (WEH) is presented in this article. According to the features of the electromagnetic field from the source to the receiver, WPT is divided into nonradiative near-field technology and radiative (near and far-field) technologies. Many different and important designs are reviewed and compared. It is shown that metamaterials and metasurfaces can significantly improve the power transfer efficiency and operational distance for WPT systems. They can also improve the energy conversion efficiency of wireless energy harvesters by making the reception less sensitive to incident wave angle and polarization. A rectenna is a critical element for both WPT and WEH. It is shown that metamaterial-based rectennas can achieve a higher RF to dc conversion efficiency. Furthermore, metamaterials can also be used as either parasitic elements or loading components to improve WEH performance in terms of circuit size, beamwidth, and conversion efficiency. Future development directions and opportunities of metamaterials and metasurfaces for WPT and WEH are also proposed in this article.

Metamaterials and Metasurfaces for Wireless Power Transfer and Energy Harvesting