All-optical switching using supramolecular chiral structures in azopolymers

Abstract

The self-rotation on the polarization azimuth and the formation of a supramolecular chiral structure when an elliptically polarized light beam propagates through an amorphous azopolymer film are used to implement a two-wavelength chiroptical switch. The macrostructures generated by each excitation beam have different pitches, which produce different rotation angles of the polarization ellipse when an arbitrary probe beam is used. In the proposed device, one of the excitation beams is taken as a probe. The value and the sign of the rotation angle of the polarization ellipse of the probe beam when the second beam is illuminating the sample mainly depend on the relationship between their input states of polarization.