Over 200 °C Broad‐Temperature Lasers Reconstructed from a Blue‐Phase Polymer Scaffold

Abstract

Blue‐phase liquid crystal (BPLC) lasers have received extensive attention and have potential applications in sensors, displays, and anti‐counterfeiting, owing to their unique 3D photonic bandgap. However, the working temperature range of such BPLC lasers is insufficient, and investigations are required to elucidate the underlying mechanism. Herein, a broad‐temperature reconstructed laser is successfully achieved in dye‐doped polymer‐stabilized blue‐phase liquid crystals (DD‐PSBPLCs) with an unprecedented working temperature range of 25–230 °C based on a robust polymer scaffold, which combines the thermal stability and the tunability from the system. The broad‐temperature lasing stems from the high thermal stability of the robust polymerized system used, which affords enough reflected and matched fluorescence signals. The temperature‐tunable lasing behavior of the DD‐PSBPLCs is associated with the phase transition of the unpolymerized content (≈60 wt%) in the system, which endows with a reconstructed characteristic of BP lasers including a U‐shaped lasing threshold, a reversible lasing wavelength, and an obvious lasing enhancement at about 70 °C. This work not only provides a new idea for the design of broad‐temperature BPLC lasers, but also sets out important insight in innovative microstructure changes for novel multifunctional organic optic devices.

Super‐Wide Temperature Lasers Spanning from −180 to 240 °C Based on Fully‐Polymerized Blue Phase Superstructures

“…To further highlight the superiority of the fully‐polymerized BPLC lasers in this system. The laser performance was compared with conventional C6M + C6 systems [ 40 ] with different polymerization. Dye‐doped BPLCs in different polymerized contents were fabricated by partial replacement polymerizable LC components with small molecules HTG for both C6M + C6 and RM105 + RM257 + DCM systems.…”

High birefringence liquid crystals with a wide temperature range and low melting point for augmented reality displays

“…Broad temperature adaptability is a key performance evaluator for the widespread applications of all optoelectronic devices, which have attracted significant attention in various fields, such as proton exchange membrane fuel cells, 1,2 perovskite solar cells, 3,4 lithium ion batteries, [5][6][7] supercapacitors, 8,9 and liquid crystal (LC) devices. [10][11][12][13] Augmented reality (AR) displays, one of the emerging research hotspots of LC devices, [14][15][16][17] are subject to device failure at low temperature resulting from the temperature-dependent properties of the LC materials used in AR displays. Therefore, there is an urgent need to find effective ways to lower the working temperature of LC devices to enhance their ambient temperature tolerance.…”

Simultaneous optical tuning of reflection and fluorescence in a self-organized simple 3D cubic structure by α-cyanodiarylethene-based chiral fluorescence photoswitches

“…Blue-phase liquid crystals (BPLCs), as typical 3D soft photonic materials, [1][2][3][4][5] have attracted much attention because of their remarkable properties and promising potential for applications, such as in tunable mirrorless lasers, [6][7][8] phase grating, 9,10 light addressing displays, 11 and spatial phase modulation. 12,13 BPLCs can assemble into a 3D cubic structure from the competition between chiral forces and packing topology.…”