Transmissive flexoelectro-optic liquid crystal optical phase modulator with 2 π modulation

Wang, Xiuze; Fells, Julian A. J.; Ali, Taimoor; Lin, Jia De; Welch, Chris; Mehl, Georg H.; Wilkinson, Timothy D.; Booth, Martin J.; Morris, Stephen M.; Elston, Steve J.

Abstract

© 2020 Author(s). In this paper, we demonstrate analog phase modulation in a transmissive configuration using the flexoelectro-optic effect in short-pitch chiral nematic liquid crystal (LC) devices. Two different modes are considered, both of which are shown to generate full 2πphase modulation at 1 kHz switching frequency. The first configuration that is considered consists of a half-wave plate that is placed between two flexoelectro-optic LC devices that are subjected to electric fields that are applied in phase. Second, we demonstrate that a similar phase modulation response can be observed by removing the half-wave plate and subjecting the two flexoelectro-optic LC devices to electric fields whereby the polarities are out of phase. Both configurations demonstrated herein are promising for the development of next-generation LC spatial light modulators, particularly when reflective geometries are challenging or impractical.

Citation

Wang, X., Fells, J. A. J., Ali, T., Lin, J. D., Welch, C., Mehl, G. H., …Elston, S. J. (2020). Transmissive flexoelectro-optic liquid crystal optical phase modulator with 2 π modulation. AIP Advances, 10(5), Article 055011. https://doi.org/10.1063/5.0009630

• Journal Article Type: Article
• Acceptance Date: Apr 22, 2020
• Online Publication Date: May 8, 2020
• Publication Date: 2020-05
• Deposit Date: May 27, 2020
• Publicly Available Date: May 27, 2020
• Journal: AIP Advances
• Print ISSN: 2158-3226
• Electronic ISSN: 2158-3226
• Publisher: AIP Publishing
• Peer Reviewed: Peer Reviewed
• Volume: 10
• Issue: 5
• Article Number: 055011
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1063/5.0009630
• Keywords: General Physics and Astronomy
• Public URL: https://hull-repository.worktribe.com/output/3512794
• Publisher URL: https://aip.scitation.org/doi/10.1063/5.0009630
• Additional Information: Received: 2020-04-01; Accepted: 2020-04-22; Published: 2020-05-08