Saturday, October 21, 2017

Abstract-Generating, Separating and Polarizing Terahertz Vortex Beams via Liquid Crystals with Gradient-Rotation Directors



Shi-Jun Ge, Zhi-Xiong Shen, Peng Chen, Xiao Liang,  Xin-Ke Wang,  Wei Hu, OrcID, Yan Zhang, Yan-Qing Lu


http://www.mdpi.com/2073-4352/7/10/314

Liquid crystal (LC) is a promising candidate for terahertz (THz) devices. Recently, LC has been introduced to generate THz vortex beams. However, the efficiency is intensely dependent on the incident wavelength, and the transformed THz vortex beam is usually mixed with the residual component. Thus, a separating process is indispensable. Here, we introduce a gradient blazed phase, and propose a THz LC forked polarization grating that can simultaneously generate and separate pure THz vortices with opposite circular polarization. The specific LC gradient-rotation directors are implemented by a photoalignment technique. The generated THz vortex beams are characterized with a THz imaging system, verifying features of polarization controllability. This work may pave a practical road towards generating, separating and polarizing THz vortex beams, and may prompt applications in THz communications, sensing and imaging.

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