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2026

Metasubstrate Biosensor for Terahertz-Based Phenotypic Analysis of Cancer Cells

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A team led by Tie Jun Cui and Yang Shen at Southeast University has proposed a metasurface biosensor based on frequency-band folding, which supports a high-density array of free-space excitation modes. Building on a Fourier-series theoretical framework developed by the authors for predicting coupling strengths, they introduce perturbations into a hexagonal superlattice to convert numerous symmetry-protected hidden modes into radiative resonances. This multimode platform is then applied to phenotypic analysis of various biological cells in the terahertz frequency range. Histopathological validation demonstrates that the dense intracellular accumulation of biomolecules and enlarged nuclei in malignant cells give rise to pronounced differences in volumetric dielectric constants. This mechanism enables rapid discrimination between cancer cell phenotypes and normal cell phenotypes. The authors’ work integrates metamaterial device physics with insights into biological structures, thereby expanding the potential applications of mode-multiplexing metamaterials in phenotypic screening.

The research findings were published in Photonix on January 19, 2026, under the title “Band folding unlocks high-density hidden modes for sub-terahertz cancer cell phenotyping.”