Photoinduced liquid crystal alignment based on a surface relief grating in an assembled cell

Surface relief gratings have been optically inscribed on azopolymer films on the interior surface of an empty liquid crystal (LC) cell. Uniform LC alignment is observed in the inscribed regions when the cell is filled. Since the microgrooves are on both sides, this may provide a higher degree of order than other techniques. The stability of the relief gratings and the transmittance of the azopolymer films can be further improved by photobleaching. This alignment technique could have useful applications in the in-plane switching LC displays.

[1]  Paul Rochon,et al.  Azo Polymers for Reversible Optical Storage. 7. The Effect of the Size of the Photochromic Groups , 1995 .

[2]  S. Kobayashi,et al.  Measurement of Azimuthal Anchoring Energy at Liquid Crystal/Photopolymer Interface , 1997 .

[3]  M. Schadt,et al.  Surface-Induced Parallel Alignment of Liquid Crystals by Linearly Polymerized Photopolymers , 1992 .

[4]  Jayant Kumar,et al.  Gradient force: The mechanism for surface relief grating formation in azobenzene functionalized polymers , 1998 .

[5]  M. Kakimoto,et al.  Azimuthal Photoregulation of a Liquid Crystal with an Azobenzene-Modified Polyimide Langmuir-Blodgett Monolayer , 1995 .

[6]  I. Sage,et al.  Voltage-dependent anchoring of a nematic liquid crystal on a grating surface , 1998, Nature.

[7]  J. Litster,et al.  Alignment of nematic butoxybenzilidene octylaniline by surface-relief gratings , 1981 .

[8]  S. Hvilsted,et al.  Atomic force and optical near‐field microscopic investigations of polarization holographic gratings in a liquid crystalline azobenzene side‐chain polyester , 1996 .

[9]  Paul Rochon,et al.  Model of laser-driven mass transport in thin films of dye-functionalized polymers , 1998 .

[10]  Toru Hashimoto,et al.  Alignment Control of Liquid Crystal Molecules using Photo-Dimerization Reaction of Poly (Vinyl Cinnamate) (Special Issue on Liquid-Crystal Displays) , 1996 .

[11]  J. Sambles,et al.  Determination of azimuthal anchoring energy in grating-aligned twisted nematic liquid-crystal layers , 1997 .

[12]  Wayne M. Gibbons,et al.  Surface-mediated alignment of nematic liquid crystals with polarized laser light , 1991, Nature.

[13]  Paul Rochon,et al.  Optically induced surface gratings on azoaromatic polymer films , 1995 .

[14]  Katsumi Kondo,et al.  Electro‐optical characteristics and switching behavior of the in‐plane switching mode , 1995 .

[15]  D. W. Berreman,et al.  Solid Surface Shape and the Alignment of an Adjacent Nematic Liquid Crystal , 1972 .

[16]  Jean-Michel Nunzi,et al.  Anisotropy of the photo-induced translation diffusion of azobenzene dyes in polymer matrices , 1998 .

[17]  J. Kumar,et al.  Laser‐induced holographic surface relief gratings on nonlinear optical polymer films , 1995 .

[18]  Shunsuke Kobayashi,et al.  Multidomain TN-LCD fabricated by photoalignment , 1997, Electronic Imaging.