Gold nanoparticle liquid crystal composites as a tunable nonlinear medium
Gold nanoparticle liquid crystal composites as a tunable nonlinear medium
We investigate the nonlinearity of a liquid crystal cell doped with gold nanoparticles by considering their selective absorption. Such nonlinearities are promising for optical processing applications and optical limiters. Systems displaying thermal nonlinearities are particularly attractive as the maximum nonlinearity may occur in the absence of an applied field and additionally this nonlinearity can be controlled by the reorientation of the liquid crystal. We show that there exists a theoretical optimum concentration of absorbers, which maximizes the nonlinearity. Further we show that the nonlinearity of the system can be tuned by the reorientation of the liquid crystal host, with the nonlinearity decreasing from 9 × 10-5 cm2/W to zero by the application of a magnetic field of the order of 0.01 Tesla. This allows a fine control of the diffraction efficiency and, in principle, many other nonlinear effects.
1-8
Acreman, Andrew
ef092c1d-3879-4dd8-8e8b-22f202debdb4
Kaczmarek, Malgosia
408ec59b-8dba-41c1-89d0-af846d1bf327
D'Alessandro, Giampaolo
bad097e1-9506-4b6e-aa56-3e67a526e83b
8 July 2014
Acreman, Andrew
ef092c1d-3879-4dd8-8e8b-22f202debdb4
Kaczmarek, Malgosia
408ec59b-8dba-41c1-89d0-af846d1bf327
D'Alessandro, Giampaolo
bad097e1-9506-4b6e-aa56-3e67a526e83b
Acreman, Andrew, Kaczmarek, Malgosia and D'Alessandro, Giampaolo
(2014)
Gold nanoparticle liquid crystal composites as a tunable nonlinear medium.
Physical Review E, 90 (1), , [12504].
(doi:10.1103/PhysRevE.90.012504).
Abstract
We investigate the nonlinearity of a liquid crystal cell doped with gold nanoparticles by considering their selective absorption. Such nonlinearities are promising for optical processing applications and optical limiters. Systems displaying thermal nonlinearities are particularly attractive as the maximum nonlinearity may occur in the absence of an applied field and additionally this nonlinearity can be controlled by the reorientation of the liquid crystal. We show that there exists a theoretical optimum concentration of absorbers, which maximizes the nonlinearity. Further we show that the nonlinearity of the system can be tuned by the reorientation of the liquid crystal host, with the nonlinearity decreasing from 9 × 10-5 cm2/W to zero by the application of a magnetic field of the order of 0.01 Tesla. This allows a fine control of the diffraction efficiency and, in principle, many other nonlinear effects.
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Published date: 8 July 2014
Organisations:
Quantum, Light & Matter Group, Applied Mathematics
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Local EPrints ID: 366766
URI: http://eprints.soton.ac.uk/id/eprint/366766
ISSN: 1539-3755
PURE UUID: 066a88fb-4b1c-425a-8671-4fe94c33e2f0
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Date deposited: 09 Jul 2014 15:20
Last modified: 15 Mar 2024 02:48
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Author:
Andrew Acreman
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