Reflection chromaticity of multilayered structures incorporating cholesteric liquid crystals

Abstract

We investigate the chromaticity of the light reflected by multilayered structures containing cholesteric liquid crystals (ChLCs). We considered a single-pitched ChLC multilayered system with quasiperiodic Fibonaccian phase defects as well as an alternate sequence of single-pitched ChLC and isotropic dielectric layers. Using the Berreman 4×4 matrix formalism, we numerically obtain the reflection spectrum and the chromaticity diagram of these structures. The associated chromaticity is shown to depend on the incidence angle. However, for the ChLC Fibonaccian phase defect system, the color shift can be controlled by the defect angle α. For the F4 generation and α=π/3, the chromaticity of the reflected light remains close to the white color region for a wide range of incidence angles, followed by a blueshift at intermediate incidence angles. This is the setup that produces the nearest omnidirectional red-green-blue condition for the reflection spectrum. On the other hand, the structure with alternate ChLC and isotropic layers exhibits a complex sequence of color shifts when the incidence angle is increased.