Features and Potentialities of Static Passive EM Skins for NLOS Specular Wireless Links

The ability of passive flat patterned electromagnetic skins (EMSs) to overcome the asymptotic limit of the total path attenuation (TPA) of flat metallic reflectors of arbitrary size in non-line-of-sight (NLOS) specular wireless links is assessed. Closed-form expressions for the achievable TPA in EMS-powered NLOS links as well as the condition on the panel size of EMS-screens to improve the performance of flat passive conductive screens (PCSs) with the same aperture are derived and numerically validated by considering different incidence angles, screen apertures, transmitter/receiver distances, antenna gains, meta-atom geometries, and carrier frequencies.