High-quality, low-power optical phase conjugation in films of an azo-containing side-chain liquid crystal polymer

Abstract

Summary form only given. Optical phase conjugation (OPC) by four-wave mixing in novel organic materials is of particular interest for optical data processing and adaptive optics. Photosensitive polymers with nonlinear-optical dyes covalently attached to a polymer backbone seem to be one of the most suitable for these applications because of their high chemical stability and durability for long-term CW operation. Among known types of such materials, azo-containing side-chain polymers have received much attention in the past few years. In this report we present high-quality, low-power phase conjugation in the film of azo-containing LC polymer. We investigated the transient dynamics of compensation of wavefront distortions in the case of high order aberrations. The influence of experimental conditions (film temperature and laser beam intensities) on the performance of the OPC system was studied to determine the optimal regimes of operation.