Multichannel photonic devices based on tristable polymer-stabilized cholesteric textures.

We demonstrate in this paper an electrically tunable photonic device based on one-dimensional photonic crystal (PC) infiltrated with polymer-stabilized cholesteric texture (PSCT) as a central defect layer. With the hybrid PC/PSCT structure, not only is the wavelength of each defect mode switchable among three major stable states by various appropriate frequency-modulated voltage pulses, but also the intensity can be electrically tuned in multi-metastable states. As a result, an electrically controllable multichannel photonic device with several alluring features is proposed. It is wavelength-switchable, intensity-tunable, and polarizer-free and possesses optical tristability in the defect modes to reduce power consumption.