Dr Hafiz Saad Khaliq

Dr Hafiz Saad Khaliq is a Lecturer (Assistant Professor) in the School of Engineering at the University of Leicester, where he is a member of the Green Energy and Transport (GrEaT) Group. Previously, he was Postdoctoral Researcher in the James Watt School of Engineering at the University of Glasgow developing RF and optical devices for quantum sensing.

Before joining Glasgow, he was a Brain Korea 21 (BK21) Postdoctoral Research Fellow at Kyungpook National University (KNU), South Korea, working on optical devices for augmented reality, tunable liquid crystal optics and millimetre wave beamforming. He was also a Visiting Research Fellow at King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST), Saudi Arabia, where he helped establish the metamaterials research theme and an optics characterisation laboratory.

Dr Khaliq received his PhD in Electrical Engineering from the Information Technology University (ITU), Lahore, Pakistan, for his work on nano-surfaces with strong chiro-optical effects for advanced optical displays. His research brings applied electromagnetics and nanophotonics to the group's net zero energy and transport agenda, with a focus on metamaterials/metasurfaces, high-Q sensing and programmable surfaces for communications. He has authored more than 60 peer-reviewed research articles, including articles in Nature Portfolio: Light: Science & Applications, Advanced Functional Materials, Nano Letters, Laser & Photonics Reviews, Advanced Optical Materials and Nanoscale Horizons. He holds the Royal Academy of Engineering Global Talent Endorsement and has been named in the Stanford-Elsevier list of the top 2% most-cited scientists worldwide.

Dr Khaliq contributes to two research themes of the Green Energy and Transport (GrEaT) Group: Electromagnetics, Metasurfaces and Metamaterials, and Communications Systems. He designs engineered surfaces and devices that control electromagnetic waves from RF to ultraviolet wavelengths, and uses them to make energy, transport, communication and medical systems lighter, more efficient and more intelligent. His research supports the group's net zero mission in four areas.

• Metasurfaces and metamaterials for energy-efficient optics and displays. Flat, lightweight metasurface optics that can replace bulky lenses and filters, reducing the size, weight and power of optical systems on electric vehicles, UAVs, aircraft and satellites.
• High-Q and quantum sensing for electrified systems. Bound states in the continuum (BIC) and quasi-BIC metasurfaces with ultrahigh quality factors, excitonic enhancement for quantum photonics, and RF and optical quantum sensors. A key aim is to apply these compact, highly sensitive sensors to monitor the health of batteries, power electronics, electrical machines and superconducting cables.
• Programmable surfaces and antennas for aviation, satellite and 5G+ communications. Programmable surfaces, wideband and multiband antennas, meta-reflectarrays and liquid crystal based millimetre wave beamforming for lightweight platforms. This work targets resilient, low-power connectivity for electric aviation, UAVs, satellites and smart grids, as well as RF energy harvesting for self-powered wireless sensors.
• Medical and defence imaging and sensing. Reconfigurable surfaces for bio-sensing and bio-imaging, chiral metasurfaces for enhanced circular dichroism spectroscopy, and metasurface-based imaging and beam control for security and defence applications.

In line with the group's physical and digital twin approach, his work combines full-wave electromagnetic modelling (Lumerical FDTD, CST and Ansys HFSS), data-driven and AI-assisted design and high-performance computing with micro- and nanofabrication and optical and microwave characterisation.

He welcomes collaboration across the academia and industry on sensing, communications and metasurface technologies for net zero energy and transport.

Dr Khaliq's publication record comprises more than 60 peer-reviewed research papers, spanning applied electromagnetics, metasurfaces, chiral and nanophotonics, bound states in the continuum and quantum sensing, imaging and holographic displays, programmable surfaces and antenna design. His work has appeared in leading journals including Light: Science & Applications (Nature Portfolio), Advanced Functional Materials, Nano Letters, Laser & Photonics Reviews and Advanced Optical Materials. The selected publications below are organised according to his four research themes. A complete and up-to-date publication list is available on Google Scholar.

Review articles

1. Hafiz Saad Khaliq and Hak-Rin Kim, "Recent advances in photonic bound states in the continuum: from fundamentals to engineering and implementation," Laser & Photonics Reviews, e01883, 2026.
2. Hafiz Saad Khaliq, Asad Nauman, Jae-Won Lee and Hak-Rin Kim, "Recent progress on plasmonic and dielectric chiral metasurfaces: fundamentals, design strategies, and implementation," Advanced Optical Materials, 2300644, 2023.

High-Q and Quantum Sensing

1. Hafiz Saad Khaliq, Min-Seok Kim and Hak-Rin Kim, "Ultrahigh-Q spin-selective dual quasi-BIC resonances in ultraviolet dielectric metasurfaces," Materials & Design, 256, 114343, 2025.
2. Hafiz Saad Khaliq, Inki Kim, Aima Zahid, Joohoon Kim, Taejun Lee, Trevon Badloe, Yeseul Kim, Muhammad Zubair, Kashif Riaz, Muhammad Qasim Mehmood and Junsuk Rho, "Giant chiro-optical responses in multipolar-resonances-based single-layer dielectric metasurfaces," Photonics Research, 9(9), 1667-1674, 2021.
3. Hafiz Saad Khaliq, Inki Kim, Joohoon Kim, Dong Kyo Oh, Muhammad Zubair, Kashif Riaz, Muhammad Qasim Mehmood and Junsuk Rho, "Manifesting simultaneous optical spin conservation and spin isolation in diatomic metasurfaces," Advanced Optical Materials, 2002002, 2021.

Metasurfaces for Energy-efficient Optics and Displays

1. Jung Yeop Shin, Jae-Won Lee, Hafiz Saad Khaliq, et al., "Triple wavefront modulation of quarter-waveplate geometric phase lens: vergence-matching accommodative multi-depth switching for visual fatigue-free extended reality optics," Light: Science & Applications, 14, 333, 2025.
2. Aqsa Asad, Hafiz Saad Khaliq (equal contribution), et al., "Wide-angled pragmatic dielectric chiral meta-platform for spin- and wavelength-multiplexed holography in the ultraviolet and visible," Advanced Functional Materials, 2402744, 2024.
3. Sabiha Latif, Hafiz Saad Khaliq (equal contribution), et al., "Spin-selective angular dispersion control in dielectric metasurfaces for multichannel meta-holographic displays," Nano Letters, 24(2), 708-714, 2024.
4. Aqsa Asad, Hafiz Saad Khaliq (equal contribution), Joohoon Kim, Muhammad Zubair, Kashif Riaz, Muhammad Qasim Mehmood and Junsuk Rho, "Spin-isolated ultraviolet-visible dynamic meta-holographic displays with liquid crystal modulators," Nanoscale Horizons, 8, 759-766, 2023.
5. Hafiz Saad Khaliq, Joohoon Kim, Taimoor Naeem, Kashif Riaz, Trevon Badloe, Junhwa Seong, Jehan Akbar, Muhammad Zubair, Muhammad Qasim Mehmood, Yehia Massoud and Junsuk Rho, "Broadband chiro-optical effects for futuristic meta-holographic displays," Advanced Optical Materials, 2201175, 2022.
6. Taimoor Naeem, Joohoon Kim, Hafiz Saad Khaliq (equal contribution), et al., "Dynamic chiral metasurfaces for broadband phase-gradient holographic displays," Advanced Optical Materials, 11, 2202278, 2023.

Medical Sensing and Responsive Materials

1. Asif Ali, Hafiz Saad Khaliq (equal contribution), Aqsa Asad, Jehan Akbar, Muhammad Zubair, Muhammad Qasim Mehmood and Yehia Massoud, "Dielectric chiral metasurfaces for enhanced circular dichroism spectroscopy at near-infrared regime," RSC Advances, 13, 20958-20965, 2023.
2. Bilal ud din Khan, Hafiz Saad Khaliq, et al., "Highly sensitive and reversible colorimetric humidity sensor with hydrophilic structure templated by cholesteric liquid crystal," Reactive and Functional Polymers, 223, 106729, 2026.
3. Asad Nauman, Hafiz Saad Khaliq, Jun-Chan Choi, Jae-Won Lee and Hak-Rin Kim, "Topologically engineered strain redistribution in elastomeric substrates for dually tunable anisotropic plasmomechanical responses," ACS Applied Materials & Interfaces, 2024.

Antennas, Reflectarrays and Communications

1. Hafiz Saad Khaliq, Muhammad Rizwan Akram, Kashif Riaz, Muhammad Afnan Ansari, Jehan Akbar, Jin Zhang, Weiren Zhu, Dajun Zhang, Xiong Wang, Muhammad Zubair and Muhammad Qasim Mehmood, "Single-layered meta-reflectarray for polarization retention and spin-encrypted phase-encoding," Optics Express, 29(3), 3230-3242, 2021.

Dr Khaliq welcomes enquiries from prospective PhD students, visiting research students and postdoctoral researchers. He aims to give researchers both a strong grounding in fundamental electromagnetics and hands-on skills in simulation, fabrication and measurement. He encourages the people he supervises to tackle challenging scientific questions while developing technologies with real impact on energy, transport, healthcare and communications. Collaboration across disciplines and professional growth are central to how he supervises. This includes support with publishing, presenting at international conferences and building independent research careers.

Current research opportunities

He welcomes applications in the following research areas:

• Metamaterials and Metasurfaces for Energy, Transport and Defence
• Bound States in the Continuum (BIC) and High-Q Photonics
• Quantum and Optical Sensing
• Chiral Nanophotonics, Meta-Holography and AR/VR Display Optics
• Reconfigurable Intelligent Surfaces for 5G+, Satellite and Aviation Communications
• Antenna Design, Millimetre Wave Beamforming and RF Energy Harvesting
• Metasurfaces for Bio-Sensing and Medical Imaging
• AI-Assisted Design and Computational Electromagnetics

He is also happy to support strong candidates applying for externally funded scholarships (e.g. Commonwealth, HEC, CSC, and other national or international funding schemes).

Supervision experience

To date, Dr Khaliq has co-supervised two PhD student and four MS research students, all of whom have graduated, and mentored graduate researchers across the University of Leicester, University of Glasgow, Kyungpook National University (KNU, South Korea) and Information Technology University (ITU, Pakistan). The students he has supervised have published as lead authors in leading journals including Light Science & Application, Advanced Functional Materials, Nano Letters, Nanoscale Horizons and ACS Applied Materials & Interfaces.

Prospective students are encouraged to contact him by email with a CV, academic transcripts and a brief description of their research interests.

Teaching (University of Leicester)

• EG4324/ EG7324 – Signal Processing

Professional Memberships

• Senior Member, Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE)
• Member, Optica (formerly the Optical Society of America)
• Member, SPIE, the international society for optics and photonics
• Registered Engineer, Pakistan Engineering Council (PEC)

Peer Review

Reviewer for leading journals including Advanced Materials, Advanced Optical Materials, Laser & Photonics Reviews (Wiley); Optica, Optics Letters, Optics Express (Optica Publishing Group); and Materials & Design, iScience, Infrared Physics & Technology, International Journal of Thermal Sciences and Optics Communications (Elsevier); Photonics Technology Letters (IEEE).

Outreach and Leadership

• Founding President, SPIE ITU Student Chapter (2019 to 2021)
• Vice President, Optica (formerly OSA) ITU Student Chapter (2019 to 2020)
• Secured an SPIE microgrant to organise the International Day of Light 2021 event at Information Technology University, Lahore

• Global Talent Endorsement, Royal Academy of Engineering
• Brain Korea (BK21) Postdoctoral Fellowship, Kyungpook National University (2023 to 2024)
• Named in the Stanford-Elsevier list of the top 2% most-cited scientists worldwide (2024)
• Nanoscale Horizons Most Popular Article (2023)
• Advanced Optical Materials Top Cited Article (2023)
• Fully funded PhD Fellowship, Information Technology University, Lahore
• National Outreach Program (NOP) Fellowship for MS in Electrical Engineering, LUMS
• Gold Medal for overall first position in BSc Telecommunication Engineering, IUB

PhD in Electrical Engineering, Information Technology University, Pakistan (specialization in Optics, Photonics and Applied Electromagnetics)