Liquid‐Crystal‐Mediated Active Waveguides toward Programmable Integrated Optics

Abstract

Optics, playing an ever‐important role in life, is developing toward miniaturization and integration. Particularly, the field programming of integrated optics will benefit its functionality and durability, thus is highly pursued. Here, through precisely controlling the space‐variant orientations of anisotropic liquid crystals (LCs), various graded‐index waveguides are demonstrated in a homogeneous medium. Straight/bending waveguides and ring resonators are fabricated via LC photopatterning. They exhibit pronounced polychromatic light‐guiding performance. Thanks to their intrinsic external‐stimuli responsivity, the thermal switchability and polarization tunability are verified. By selectively polymerizing, robust functional components and active connecting waveguides can be realized on the same chip. It provides a practical and universal solution to programmable integrated optics, and extends the applications of microstructured soft matter even in wearable photonics.

Properties of liquid-crystal wave-guiding structures

“…ref. 1–18). A detailed description of the liquid crystal cell structure and its image have been given earlier.…”

“…For a more detailed acquaintance with the latest achievements in this rapidly developing branch of science and technology, we strongly recommend that you familiarize yourself with the publications. 3–18…”

“…The list of required literature on this topic and related areas can be easily expanded by citations in the indicated publications. 1–33 From this point of view, of undoubted interest is, for example, the review. 18 At the same time, it should be emphasized that it is really possible to give a detailed analysis of the development of the situation in the actively developing field of science and technology only in a special review.…”

“…A brief analysis of scientific publications devoted to the development of research in the field of liquid crystals 1,2 and their applications in integrated optics [3][4][5][6][7][8][9][10][11][12][13][14][15][16][17][18] is made. The most interesting, from our point of view, works, both for science and for practice, are marked.…”

Simultaneous Surface Display and Holography Enabled by Flat Liquid Crystal Elements

“…It has attracted widespread attention benefiting from the excellent material properties, such as controllable and reconfigurable orientation, large birefringence and high transparency, external field stimuli (e.g., electric field, magnetic field, temperature, strain, etc.,), etc. [1][2][3][4][5][6][7] As a representative case, the liquid crystal display has been widely applied including smartphones, TVs, and desktop computers. It can be regarded as an example for tunable intensity modulation and reaches a mature stage.…”