Low-voltage blue phase liquid crystal displays

Polymer-stabilised blue phase liquid crystal displays (PS-BPLCD) based on Kerr effect have become an increasingly important technology for information display applications. In comparison with conventional nematic LC devices, BPLCs exhibit several attractive features, such as sub-millisecond grey-to-grey response time, reasonably wide temperature range, no need for alignment layer, optically isotropic voltage-off state and large cell gap tolerance. However, some technical challenges such as high operation voltage, hysteresis, residual birefringence and relatively low transmittance remain to be overcome before their widespread applications can be realised. Recent progress on BPLC materials and devices has shown great promise. From material aspect, the electro-optical properties of blue phase liquid crystal material system are studied. To realise the electro-optic effect of PS-BPLC, novel device configurations that can dramatically improve the display performances are designed.