An Overview of Electromagnetic Illusions: Empowering Smart Environments with Reconfigurable Metasurfaces

This study delves into the innovative landscape of metasurfaces, with a particular focus on their role in achieving EM illusion (EMI) a facet of paramount significance. The control of EM waves assumes a pivotal role in mitigating issues such as signal degradation, interference, and reduced communication range. Furthermore, the engineering of waves serves as a foundational element in achieving invisibility or minimized detectability. This survey unravels the theoretical underpinnings and practical designs of EMI coatings, which have been harnessed to develop functional metasurfaces. EMI, practically achieved through engineered coatings, confers a strategic advantage by either reducing the radar cross-section of objects or creating misleading footprints. In addition to illustrating the outstanding achievements in reconfigurable cloaking, this study culminates in the proposal of a novel approach, suggesting the emergence of EMI without the need for physically coating the device to conceal and thus proposing the concept of a smart EMI environment. This groundbreaking work opens a new way for engineers and researchers to unlock exotic and versatile designs that build on reconfigurable intelligent surfaces (RIS). Crucially the designs enabled by the proposed approach, present a wide array of applications, encompassing camouflaging, deceptive sensing, radar cognition control, and defence security, among others. In essence, this research stands as a beacon guiding the exploration of uncharted territories in wave control through smart EMI environments, with profound implications spanning basic academic research in RIS through advanced security technologies and communication systems.