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29 September 2023 Knots in optical axis fields of uniaxial birefringent media
Ivan I. Smalyukh
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Proceedings Volume PC12658, Liquid Crystals XXVII; PC126580E (2023) https://doi.org/10.1117/12.2675021
Event: SPIE Organic Photonics + Electronics, 2023, San Diego, California, United States
Abstract
Liquid crystals are widely known for their technological uses in displays, electro-optics, photonics and nonlinear optics, but these applications typically rely on defining and switching non-topological spatial patterns of the optical axis. Here, we demonstrate how a liquid crystal’s optical axis patterns with singular vortex lines can robustly steer beams of light. External stimuli, including an electric field and light itself, allow us to reconfigure these unusual light–matter interactions. Periodic arrays of vortices obtained by photo-patterning enable the vortex-mediated fission of optical solitons, yielding their lightning-like propagation patterns. Predesigned patterns and spatial trajectories of vortex lines in high-birefringence liquid crystals can steer light into closed loops or even knots. Our vortex lattices might find technological uses in beam steering, telecommunications, virtual reality implementations and anticounterfeiting, as well as possibly offering a model system for probing the interaction of light with defects, including the theoretically predicted, imagination-capturing light-steering action of cosmic strings, elusive defects in cosmology.
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Ivan I. Smalyukh "Knots in optical axis fields of uniaxial birefringent media", Proc. SPIE PC12658, Liquid Crystals XXVII, PC126580E (29 September 2023); https://doi.org/10.1117/12.2675021
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KEYWORDS
Beam steering
Liquid crystals
Crystal optics
Optical solitons
Optical switching
Photonic crystals
Photonics
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