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Liquid Crystal Enabled Dynamic Nanodevices

Inspired by the anisotropic molecular shape and tunable alignment of liquid crystals (LCs), investigations on hybrid nanodevices which combine LCs with plasmonic metasurfaces have received great attention recently. Since LCs possess unique electro-optical properties, developing novel dynamic optical...

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Autores principales: Ma, Zhenhe, Meng, Xianghe, Liu, Xiaodi, Si, Guangyuan, Liu, Yan Jun
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: MDPI 2018
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6265771/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/30360573
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/nano8110871
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author Ma, Zhenhe
Meng, Xianghe
Liu, Xiaodi
Si, Guangyuan
Liu, Yan Jun
author_facet Ma, Zhenhe
Meng, Xianghe
Liu, Xiaodi
Si, Guangyuan
Liu, Yan Jun
author_sort Ma, Zhenhe
collection PubMed
description Inspired by the anisotropic molecular shape and tunable alignment of liquid crystals (LCs), investigations on hybrid nanodevices which combine LCs with plasmonic metasurfaces have received great attention recently. Since LCs possess unique electro-optical properties, developing novel dynamic optical components by incorporating nematic LCs with nanostructures offers a variety of practical applications. Owing to the large birefringence of LCs, the optical properties of metamaterials can be electrically or optically modulated over a wide range. In this review article, we show different elegant designs of metasurface based nanodevices integrated into LCs and explore the tuning factors of transmittance/extinction/scattering spectra. Moreover, we review and classify substantial tunable devices enabled by LC-plasmonic interactions. These dynamically tunable optoelectronic nanodevices and components are of extreme importance, since they can enable a significant range of applications, including ultra-fast switching, modulating, sensing, imaging, and waveguiding. By integrating LCs with two dimensional metasurfaces, one can manipulate electromagnetic waves at the nanoscale with dramatically reduced sizes. Owing to their special electro-optical properties, recent efforts have demonstrated that more accurate manipulation of LC-displays can be engineered by precisely controlling the alignment of LCs inside small channels. In particular, device performance can be significantly improved by optimizing geometries and the surrounding environmental parameters.
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spelling pubmed-62657712018-12-06 Liquid Crystal Enabled Dynamic Nanodevices Ma, Zhenhe Meng, Xianghe Liu, Xiaodi Si, Guangyuan Liu, Yan Jun Nanomaterials (Basel) Review Inspired by the anisotropic molecular shape and tunable alignment of liquid crystals (LCs), investigations on hybrid nanodevices which combine LCs with plasmonic metasurfaces have received great attention recently. Since LCs possess unique electro-optical properties, developing novel dynamic optical components by incorporating nematic LCs with nanostructures offers a variety of practical applications. Owing to the large birefringence of LCs, the optical properties of metamaterials can be electrically or optically modulated over a wide range. In this review article, we show different elegant designs of metasurface based nanodevices integrated into LCs and explore the tuning factors of transmittance/extinction/scattering spectra. Moreover, we review and classify substantial tunable devices enabled by LC-plasmonic interactions. These dynamically tunable optoelectronic nanodevices and components are of extreme importance, since they can enable a significant range of applications, including ultra-fast switching, modulating, sensing, imaging, and waveguiding. By integrating LCs with two dimensional metasurfaces, one can manipulate electromagnetic waves at the nanoscale with dramatically reduced sizes. Owing to their special electro-optical properties, recent efforts have demonstrated that more accurate manipulation of LC-displays can be engineered by precisely controlling the alignment of LCs inside small channels. In particular, device performance can be significantly improved by optimizing geometries and the surrounding environmental parameters. MDPI 2018-10-23 /pmc/articles/PMC6265771/ /pubmed/30360573 http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/nano8110871 Text en © 2018 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
spellingShingle Review
Ma, Zhenhe
Meng, Xianghe
Liu, Xiaodi
Si, Guangyuan
Liu, Yan Jun
Liquid Crystal Enabled Dynamic Nanodevices
title Liquid Crystal Enabled Dynamic Nanodevices
title_full Liquid Crystal Enabled Dynamic Nanodevices
title_fullStr Liquid Crystal Enabled Dynamic Nanodevices
title_full_unstemmed Liquid Crystal Enabled Dynamic Nanodevices
title_short Liquid Crystal Enabled Dynamic Nanodevices
title_sort liquid crystal enabled dynamic nanodevices
topic Review
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6265771/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/30360573
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/nano8110871
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