Ray-optics analysis of inhomogeneous biaxially anisotropic media

Firm evidence of the biaxial nematic phase in liquid crystals, not induced by a magnetic or electric field, has been established only recently. The discovery of these biaxially anisotropic liquid crystals has opened up new areas of both fundamental and applied research. The advances in biaxial liquid crystal-related topics call for a good...

Simulations of a liquid-crystal-based electro-optical switch

We present simulations of a novel liquid-crystal-based electro-optical device that enables a switching effect owing to a backreflection phenomenon. In the simulations, we exploit the optical properties of a liquid-crystal layer with a Freédericksz alignment in an unconventional way. The resulting switching effect of the proposed optical design...

Characterization of the diffraction efficiency of polymer-liquid-crystal-polymer-slices gratings at all incidence angles

Recently, a novel holographic diffraction grating made of polymer slices alternated to homogeneous films of nematic liquid crystal (POLICRYPS) was realized. We study the optical performance of the POLICRYPS gratings by both numerical simulations and experiments. Characterization of the grating at normal and conical reading mount are performed....

Simulations of birefringent gratings as polarizing color separator in backlight for flat-panel displays

A color and polarization separating backlight can be obtained by using a surface-relief grating made of birefringent material as an outcoupling structure on top of the lightguide. A rigorous finite element diffraction model was applied to study the polarization effect of such a grating. The diffraction of plane waves by the anisotropic grating...