Soft Periodic Microstructures Containing Liquid Crystals

Abstract

An empty polymeric structure has been realized by combining a high precision level optical holographic setup and a selective microfluidic etching process. The distinctive features of the realized periodic microstructure enabled aligning several kinds of liquid crystal (LC) compounds, without the need of any kind of surface chemistry or functionalization. In particular, it has been possible to exploit light sensitive LCs for the fabrication of all-optical devices, cholesteric and ferroelectric LCs for ultrafast electro-optical switches, and a common LC for a two-dimensional periodic structure with high anisotropy. All-optical and electro-optical experiments, performed for investigating the samples in terms of switching voltages and response times, confirm good performances of the realized devices.

Binary Intensity Modulation and Hybrid Ternary Modulation Applied to Multiplexing Objects Using Holographic Data Storage on a PVA/AA Photopolymer

“…The polymer dispersed liquid crystals (PDLCs) can be used for the fabrication of holographic polymer dispersed liquid crystals (HPDLCs) composed of periodic LC nano-/microdomains (droplets) separated by cross-linked polymer. Besides, the PDLCs can also be used as polymer liquid crystal slices (POLICRYPS), which are composed of slices of NLC separated by polymer walls [4][5][6][7].…”