Performances of electromagnetic finite element simulators in the presence of three-dimensional double-negative scatterers

The effects of the presence of double-negative (DNG) metamaterials on the accuracy of the results computed by finite element simulators are investigated. The performances of the iterative solver usually exploited by the same simulators are analysed, too. The outcome is that finite element simulators could require much finer meshes than usual when DNG metamaterials are involved, especially in regions containing and slightly surrounding the subregions occupied by DNG media. This effect is particularly important when the DNG metamaterials involved have not a very high magnetic or electric loss tangent. The effect on the most popular iterative solver is even more evident