Uniform lying helix(ULH) is a cholesteric LC structure with helical axix lying on the substrate. This structure has a periodic refractive index profile characteristics, so that it can be used as a phase grating. The ULH period can be tuned with different electric fields which provide with various applications. However, ULH is not a steady state in general, once the electric field shutdown, ULH texture will transform to planar texture. Generally, the ULH exist only under a few conditions: well homogeneous alignment and cell the ratio of gap to pitch smaller than 2 , in case the ratio more than 2, the ULH won¡¦t align well. We use two methods to make ULH align well at large cell gap pitch ratio; cooling down from isotropic temperature under electric field and putting mechanical stress on the sample, therefore we can get a well alignment and more stable ULH. We discuss the influence of different boundary conditions to the stability of ULH, and we discover that when d/p large than 10, the stability of ULH improved significantly. Then we study the influence in different alignment anchoring, we find stronger anchoring energy makes ULH transform to planar easily. So we use photo alignment to get weaker anchoring energy, and the ULH using photo alignment stable more than 24 hours. Finally we use a large d/p ULH as tunable phase grating, the pitch length can be tuned about 380nm with low power consumption, and it still have grating function when the field shutdown . Keyword: cholesteric liquid crystal¡Buniform lying helix¡Bgrating

Polymer stabilized cholesteric liquid crystals (PSCLCs) provide many advantages over other electro-optical materials. The unique helical structure of the cholesteric liquid crystal (CLC) creates a natural gradient for light interacting across each CLC domain layer. Not only does the CLC helical structure greatly increase the bandwidth tuning and broadening range, it also allows CLCs to act as a polarizer, notch filter, reflector, and optical rotator all in one material. However, while many novel PSCLC materials have been created, little is understood about how complex initial system interactions affect final electro-optical (e-o) properties.1,2 In this work, the principal variables affecting PSCLC blue shift electro-optical behavior have been determined through structural analysis and measurement of electro-optical properties. Typical PSCLC materials must meet both formulation and photopolymerization processing requirements to display blue shift e-o properties. Threshold photoinitiator concentrations (0.5-1.5 wt%) and morpholine containing group concentrations (0.25-1.0 wt%) were both shown to be primary factors, along with sufficient UV exposure time (10-30 min) and light intensity (500 mW/cm2, 365 nm), for PSCLC blue shift bandwidth tuning/broadening to occur. Morpholine was initially identified as a component of photoinitators Irgacure 369 and 907 and was proven to increase PSCLC ion density altering LC-polymer network interactions with several proposed theories included later in this work. The use of an appropriate morpholine containing LC monomer to directly incorporate morpholine into the LC-polymer network was shown to greatly improve PSCLC sample stability. Through the results of this research we successfully induced blue shift e-o behavior in a previous red shift only PSCLC using only 30% of the UV exposure that a model PSCLC blue shift sample required while extending the blue shift broadening range over threefold (from 75 nm to 250 nm). The fundamental understanding and design of PSCLC systems described herein serves as a starting point for engineering PSCLC materials with specific and desirable electro-optical properties.

In this study, we demonstrated a flexible cholesteric liquid crystal display using polymerization induced phase separation (PIPS) on a single substrate. Cholesteric liquid-crystal displays (ChLCDs) provide with color reflection owing to their periodic helical layer, without any optic device like polarizer or color filter. We discussed the influence of surface treatment and process conditions on PIPS, and improve the reflectivity of single substrate Ch-LC display from 9.05% to 19.27%.

In this thesis, the nonlinear properties of dye-doped liquid crystal films measured via Z-scan technique are presented, and we¡¦ve also compared the features of nonlinear effect between nematic and cholesteric liquid crystals, because the purpose was to obtain a strong nonlinear effect which is polarization independent. The nonlinear refraction of the samples would induce self-focusing/self-defocusing effect, therefore the Z-scan technique was utilized for the measurements in this study. The degrees of self-focusing/self-defocusing effect can be used to calculate the optical Kerr constants n2 related to the variation of refractive indices. Moreover, this technique is uncomplicated and powerful for nonlinear effect observations, because it only requires a single laser beam and a simple setup to measure both nonlinear refractive indices and nonlinear absorption coefficients. In the first section of the study, we had investigated the nonlinear effect of azo-dye-doped liquid crystal (ADDLC) films by Z-scan technique. Owing to the birefringence provided by homogeneous-alignment liquid crystal films and the absorption difference between the long axis and the short axis of the azo dye, the self-defocusing effect in nematic phase was larger than that in isotropic state as the polarization of incident light was parallel to the long axis of aligned liquid crystals. While we set the incident polarization perpendicular to the long axis of liquid crystals, a self-focusing effect was observed and the in nematic phase was found smaller than that in isotropic state. As a result, it can be analyzed that the nonlinear effect of homogeneous aligned ADDLC films is intensely polarization-dependent. In the second section, in order to acquire a polarization-independent nonlinear effect, we fabricated the azo-dye-doped cholesteric liquid crystal (ADDCLC) films which were arranged in planar texture with the reflection bands managed to avoid the III wavelength of incident light. We had studied the nonlinear effects in different concentrations of the azo dye and also measured the influence of incident polarizations. We discover that when the concentration of dyes was raised, the n2 increased as well; the nonlinear indices were almost the same in various polarized light. The incident light suffered an average refractive index in an ADDCLC film, and azo dye arranged in helices resulted in identical absorption to different polarized light. In summary, employing ADDCLCs with planar texture in nonlinear optical applications, we could achieve not only strong nonlinear effects but also high polarization independence in liquid crystals.

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The study proposed a high efficient dye sensitize solar cell (DSSC) by embedding liquid crystal in liquid electrolyte. When liquid crystal molecules was disperse in the liquid electrolyte, the light-scattering occur due to refractive index mismatching by randomly oriented liquid crystal droplets. The light-scattering allows solar light have longer optical path length within the solar cell and therefore enhances light-trapping efficiency of N719 dye. The experiment results reveal that the DSSC with the liquid crystal concentration of 20 wt% have best electric conversion efficiency. Moreover, the study also introduces chloseteric liquid crystal to the liquid electrolyte of a DSSC and compare with nematic liquid crystal embedded DSSC. The cholesteric liquid crystal with periodic helical structure in the liquid electrolyte provides not only light-scattering but also selective reflection. Compared with nematic liquid crystal embedded DSSC, the cholesteric liquid crystal embeded DSSC has a more large light-trapping efficiency due to combined effects of light scattering and selective reflection. Besides, when the reflective band (480~580nm) of cholesteric liquid crystal is matched to the absorption spectrum of N719 dye, the DSSC has better photoexcitation of dye and photovoltaic performance.

This thesis utilized pulse shaping and Gerberg-Saxton algorithm to develop high power tunable narrowband terahertz radiation and applications. By the way of using Freezing algorithm and Gerberg-Saxton, pulse width, pulse duration, pulse position and pulse number can be controlled. The pulse train can be pumping source of high power tunable narrowband terahertz radiation, by avoid the saturations and different pulse duration. The simulation shown the result can have 5GHz narrowband width closing to commercial product. Besides, we demonstrated the THz multi-wavelength interference method by using THz-TDS (terahertz time domain spectroscopy) to measure the liquid crystal cell gap. We have also used THz-TDS to investigate the complex optical constants and birefringence of cholesteric liquid crystal mixture BL006. The extraordinary (ne) and ordinary (no) indices of refraction at are 1.784-1.817 and 1.516-1.555 giving rise to a birefringence of 0.25¡V0.29 in 0.2THz~1.6THz.

In this thesis, we propose and demonstrate a simple and precise method for measuring mm scaled cell gap by using terahertz time domain spectroscopy (THz-TDS) system. This method allows us to measure the cell gap from 15mm to 1.5mm. In addition, the accuracy of measured thickness for the proposed method is also discussed and analyzed. Meanwhile, a nematic liquid crystal BL006 with birefringence as high as 0.27 in THz frequency range and its optical properties of cholesteric liquid crystal (CLC) as mixing chiral materials are investigated and reported. The ordinary refractive index and average effective refractive index at 20oC are from 1.52 to 1.56 and from 1.61 to 1.64, respectively, in THz frequency ranging from 0.2 THz to 1.4THz. In addition, we also demonstrate that cell filled with CLC is with polarization independent property for THz radiation. Through the 5mm cell filled CLC with diluted concentration of the dopant chiral material for decreasing the critical voltage, an electric controlled polarization independent phase shifter with the modulation depth exceeding 2pi is demonstrated. Furthermore, we also investigate the driving field dependence of phase retardation and discuss the reliability.

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No description available.