Optically Transparent ITO‐Glass Shared‐Aperture Metasurface for Electrically Switchable Reflection and Transmission Wave Control

ABSTRACT

Optically transparent metasurfaces are promising platforms for integrating electrically reconfigurable electromagnetic (EM) wave control into visually open material interfaces, where optical transparency, electrical switchability, and practical aperture integration must be simultaneously preserved. A challenge is enabling the same transparent aperture to support electrically switchable wave control toward either side of an interface while remaining glass‐compatible and bias‐integrable. Existing transparent metasurfaces are largely single‐mode, whereas many reflection‐and‐transmission‐capable designs rely on intrusive layouts or non‐transparent control schemes that are unsuitable for shared apertures. Here, a transparent indium tin oxide (ITO)‐glass shared‐aperture metasurface is proposed, in which a multilayer ITO‐glass aperture and a fully planar transparent bias network are co‐designed to realize state‐selective scattering. By electrically reassigning the scattering channel, the architecture supports co‐polarized reflection‐dominant and cross‐polarized transmission‐dominant regimes within one aperture. A fabricated prototype preserves 61.7% visible transmittance, maintains dominant scattering amplitudes above 80% over 7.2–7.7 GHz, and realizes predefined 1‐bit beam steering up to ±40° in both regimes with sidelobe levels around −10 dB. Universal Software Radio Peripheral (USRP)‐based experiments demonstrate state‐selective wireless links on both sides of the interface. This work establishes a transparent ITO‐glass metasurface platform that integrates optical transparency, bias‐integrated electrical switching, and state‐selective dual‐side EM control within a single shared aperture.