[19p-E215-1~17] 4.5 Terahertz Photonics

▲ [19p-E215-7] [INVITED] Tunable terahertz elements enabled by liquid crystals and liquid crystal polymers

〇Wei Hu¹, Zhixiong Shen¹, Lei Wang², Yanqing Lu¹ (1.Nanjing Univ., 2.Nanjing Univ Posts & Telecommun)

Keywords:liquid crystal, tunable terahertz element

THz wave offers great potential for applications in security screening, nondestructive evaluation and high-speed wireless communication. It is expected that THz switches, attenuators, filters, polarization controllers and even routers will become available to handle THz waves in reconfigurable ways, just like their well-developed optical counterparts. Liquid crystal is a very promising candidate for the new platform of THz devices. However, the LC based THz components face significant challenges. Here we present a total solution for half waveplate with similar design in visible range and demonstrate various high-performance THz photonic devices for further amplitude, phase, polarization modulations and even complex wavefront controls, such as Q-plate and polarization gratings. The proposed solution may pave a simple and bright road towards various liquid crystal terahertz apparatuses.