Bi-isotropic material

In physics, engineering and materials science, a bi-isotropic material is an isotropic medium where the electric and magnetic flux densities are linearly coupled to both the electric and magnetic fields via scalar constitutive relations, including magnetoelectric coupling terms. A major subset of such materials, known as Pasteur media, are optically active: they can rotate the polarization of light in either refraction or transmission. This does not mean all materials with twist effect fall in the bi-isotropic class. The twist effect of the class of bi-isotropic materials is caused by the chirality and/or non-reciprocity of the structure of the media, in which the electric and magnetic field of an electromagnetic wave (or simply, light) interact in an unusual way.

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