Affiliation:
1. National Laboratory of Solid State Microstructures Key Laboratory of Intelligent Optical Sensing and Manipulation College of Engineering and Applied Sciences and Collaborative Innovation Center of Advanced Microstructures Nanjing University Nanjing 210023 China
2. College of Electronic and Optical Engineering & College of Flexible Electronics (Future Technology) Nanjing University of Posts and Telecommunications Nanjing 210023 China
3. Institute of Electromagnetics and Acoustics Xiamen University Xiamen 361005 China
Abstract
AbstractOrientational ordered soft matter possessing diverse microstructures has become a focal point of scientific research and technological exploration, thanks to its advancements in serving as an indispensable optical platform enabling propagation of light with multidimensional and manipulatable states. Herein, a facile way is developed to manipulate the in‐plane light beam transition dynamics by harnessing a time‐variable nematic liquid crystal (NLC) film through the electrical‐field‐induced topological defects. The results show that the dynamic change of optical branched flow is associated with the growth in the correlation length of optical potential and the reduction in the density of topological defects. The optical branching can continuously transform to deterministic and tunable beam steering at the low‐defect‐density regime through annihilation kinetics of defects. The explored soft matter system provides an excellent planar platform for the fundamental physics of light interacting with topological defects and may offer new perspectives for novel optics elements toward the applications of soft matter photonics.
Funder
Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities
Natural Science Foundation of Fujian Province
Natural Science Foundation of Jiangsu Province
National Natural Science Foundation of China
National Key Research and Development Program of China