Bubbles structure & droplet of glycerol forming system of lenses with tunable focal length

Abstract

One of the most exotic structure in liquid crystal is the cholesteric structure. Due to their periodic helical structure, cholesteric liquid crystals (CLCs) promising candidates for a myriad of different photonic applications. CLCs can exhibit bubbles domain, defects arranged in two dimensions, which have been used as an array of micro-lenses with electrically tunable focal length. The focal length of the micro-lenses is limited in micro-meter scale, moreover each micro-lens has it is own focal point. The purpose of this work is how to construct a system of lenses with just one electrically tunable focal length. The system is formed by the bubble domain (micro-lens) accompanied by additional droplet of glycerol (big-lens). Hence, by tuning the focal length of the micro-lenses, the focal length of the system can be varied. This work covers the methodology that was used for making the bubbles domain based on CLCs