Multistage smart radiator with gradient emittance based on phase change materials VO2/GST/IST

In this Letter, we present a multistage smart radiator with a gradient emittance that gradually increases with increasing temperature in the spectral range of 2.5–15 μm. Such smart radiator is a relatively simple multilayered structure composed of three phase change materials (PCMs): VO2, GST, and IST. The smart radiator achieves multistage manipulation of emittance through phase transitions of PCMs, with the largest emittance tunability of ∼0.85. The underlying mechanism involves manipulating the Fabry–Pérot resonance and antireflection. Additionally, the emittance is found to be relatively insensitive to polarization and incident angles. The proposed multistage smart radiator exposes excellent potential for exploitation in thermal management and energy conservation.