Novel Circularly Polarized Light Detectors Achieved by the Bio-assembly of Chiral Cellulose on TiO2 Nanotubes

Abstract

Circularly polarized light (CPL) has attracted much attention for broad applications in laser communication, holographic display, and optical measurement. However, traditional CPL detection devices are complicated systems, including polarized optical elements and photodetectors, and they are far away from the miniaturization and integration of devices.Herein, we provide novel circularly polarized light detectors achieved by the bio-assembly of chiral cellulose nanocrystals (CNCs) on TiO2 nanotubes (TNTs) to directly detect and recognize the CPL. The CPL-sensitive layers of CNC and light absorption arrays of TNTs with Au top-contact electrodes construct the CPL detectors. The cholesteric structure of CNCs can induce the different intensities of right-handed CPL (RCPL) and left-handed CPL (LCPL). And the different light intensities can be transferred to different photocurrent intensities by TNTs. The CNC/TNT CPL detectors can also generate differences in response time and recovery time of RCPL and LCPL, which means the CNC/TNT CPL detectors can separate the RCPL and LCPL at time sequence. We believe the design and fabrication of this novel CNC/TNT CPL detector take a step toward achieving highly integrated CPL detectors.