journal article·2021Open access

Dynamic Kerr and Pockels electro-optics of liquid crystals in nanopores for active photonic metamaterials

Andriy V. Kityk, Marcjan Nowak, Manuela Reben, Piotr Pawlik, Monika Lelonek, Anatoliy Andrushchak, Yaroslav Shchur, Nazariy Andrushchak, Patrick Huber

Nanoscale· Volume 13· Issue 44

Abstract

Photonic metamaterials with properties unattainable in base materials are already beginning to revolutionize optical component design. However, their exceptional characteristics are often static, as artificially engineered into the material during the fabrication process. This limits their application for in-operando adjustable optical devices and active optics in general. Here, for a hybrid material consisting of a liquid crystal-infused nanoporous solid, we demonstrate active and dynamic control of its meta-optics by applying alternating electric fields parallel to the long axes of its cylindrical pores. First-harmonic Pockels and second-harmonic Kerr birefringence responses, strongly depending on the excitation frequency and temperature, are observed in a frequency range from 50 Hz to 50 kHz. This peculiar behavior is quantitatively traced by a Landau-De Gennes free energy analysis to an order-disorder orientational transition of the rod-like mesogens and intimately related changes in the molecular mobilities and polar anchoring at the solid walls on the single-pore, meta-atomic scale. Thus, our study provides evidence that liquid crystal-infused nanopores exhibit integrated multi-physical couplings and reversible phase changes that make them particularly promising for the design of photonic metamaterials with thermo-electrically tunable birefringence in the emerging field of space-time metamaterials aiming at full spatio-temporal control of light.
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Research context

OpenAlex topics: Spectroscopy and Quantum Chemical Studies · Plasmonic and Surface Plasmon Research · Photonic Crystals and Applications

SciVX discovery tags are terminology-based. OpenAlex topics are source-provided classifications.

Affiliations

Faculty of Electrical Engineering, Czestochowa University of Technology, Al. Armii Krajowej 17, 42-200 Czestochowa, Poland

Faculty of Materials Science and Ceramics, AGH-University of Science and Technology, al. Mickiewicza 30, 30-059 Cracow, Poland

Faculty of Production Engineering and Materials Science, Czestochowa University of Technology, Al. Armii Krajowej 19, 42-200 Czestochowa, Poland

SmartMembranes GmbH, Heinrich-Damerow-Str. 4, 06120 Halle(Saale), Germany

Department of Applied Physics and Nanomaterials Science, Lviv Polytechnic National University, 12 Bandery Str., Lviv 79013, Ukraine

Institute for Condensed Matter Physics, 1 Svientsitskii str., 79011 Lviv, Ukraine

Department of Computer-Aided Design Systems, Lviv Polytechnic National University, 12 Bandery Str., Lviv 79013, Ukraine

Private Enterprise SoftPartners, 97 Konovalca str., 79057 Lviv, Ukraine

Hamburg University of Technology, Institute for Materials and X-Ray Physics, 21073 Hamburg, Germany

Deutsches Elektronen-Synchrotron DESY, Centre for X-Ray and Nano Science CXNS, 22607 Hamburg, Germany

Hamburg University, Centre for Hybrid Nanostructures CHyN, 22607 Hamburg, Germany

Funding

H2020 European Research Council · Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft · Ministerstwo Edukacji i Nauki

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