Flexible, Fully Solid Tunable Filters via Cholesteric Liquid Crystalline Elastomer Stimuli-Response

Stretchable, soft optical materials are currently being explored for use in automotive, aerospace, and the wearable device industries as actuators, sensors, and light modulators. Cholesteric liquid crystalline elastomers (CLCEs) are a unique class of soft materials that self-organize into a helicoidal structure. The periodic nature of the hierarchical organization of these materials produces a 1-D photonic bandgap where periodicity in the refractive index causes the elastomer to exhibit selective reflection. This talk will entail the synthesis of CLCEs with high optical quality, a tunable modulus and reflection wavelengths. Stretchable, tunable light filters will be prepared that control light in the Visible-MWIR regions of the electromagnetic spectrum. We will detail how the tunability and polarization of the reflection can be controlled by the inherent optical and material properties of the elastomer and how the optical properties can be switched in response to mechanical, photothermal, and electrical stimuli.