Title

Polarization Control Using Nematic Liquid Crystals

Abstract

A new type of nematic liquid crystal (NLC) based polarization independent 1×2 optical switch is demonstrated. Experiments show that this system is capable of converting any arbitrary input polarization into a horizontal or vertical output of high polarization extinction ratio (>26 dB). Moreover, a basic polarization independent alignment tolerant 1×2 optical switch is proposed and demonstrated, comprising a NLC-based polarization controller in cascade with half wave plates. Experiments show that this system is capable of realizing a high switch contrast (>27 dB), nearly independent of the input polarization. The measured polarization extinction ratio of the output light was about 40 dB. Our NLC-based polarization control provides low driving voltages (<5V), no moving parts, high performance and possible low insertion loss.

Publication Date

1-1-2000

Publication Title

Proceedings of SPIE - The International Society for Optical Engineering

Volume

4046

Number of Pages

118-129

Document Type

Article; Proceedings Paper

Personal Identifier

scopus

DOI Link

https://doi.org/10.1117/12.391940

Socpus ID

0033699451 (Scopus)

Source API URL

https://api.elsevier.com/content/abstract/scopus_id/0033699451

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