Lagrangian description and Hamiltonian density for the electrodynamics of dispersive metamaterials

Abstract: The Lagrangians and dissipation functions are proposed for use in the electrodynamics of the double-negative and chiral metamaterials with finite loss. The double-negative metamaterial considered here is the wires and split rings periodic structure, while the chiral metamaterial is the single-resonance helical resonators array. For either system, application of Legendre transformation leads to a Hamiltonian density identical to the energy density obtained in our previous work based on the Poynting theorem and the mechanism of the power loss. This coincidence implies the correctness of the energy density formulas obtained before. The Lagrangian description and Hamiltonian formulation can be further developed for exploring the properties of the elementary excitations or quasiparticles in dispersive metamaterials due to light-matter interactions.