Defect effect of split ring resonators in left-handed metamaterials

We studied the defect effect of split ring resonators in the one-dimensional and two-dimensional left-handed metamaterials (LHMs) by a rectangular waveguide system. In the presence of the defective split ring resonators, the magnitude of transmission peaks of left-handed metamaterials markedly decreases and the bandwidth of passband is narrowed. The phase curves have a translational shift with respect to that of perfect LHMs and their slopes remain negative. The defect effect of LHMs provides a simple method to tune LHMs, thus, the advantages of negative refraction and LHMs that have been proposed recently are more feasible.