| 摘要 |
<P>PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To provide an optical diode with which cost reduction and power saving can be realized. <P>SOLUTION: An optical diode 21 is equipped with; a cholesteric liquid crystal (CLC) layer 2 which has counterclockwise helical structure having a selective reflection wavelength band width; and a phase piece 24 which changes the phaser difference of two inherent polarized rays of light of left circularly polarized rays of light having wavelengths within the selective reflection wavelength band width of the CLC layer 2. According to the optical diode 21, when, for example, a left circularly polarized light having the wavelength within the selective reflection wavelength band width of the layer 2 is made incident on the phase piece 24, the left circularly polarized light is made right circularly polarized light by the phase piece 24 and the right circularly polarized light can pass the layer 2. On the other hand, when left circularly polarized light having the wavelength within the selective reflection wavelength band width of the layer 2 is made incident on the layer 2, the left circularly polarized light is selectively reflected on the layer 2. Thus, an optical diode characteristic is realized. Moreover, according to the optical diode 21, manufacture does not take a lot of time and labor. Furthermore, since a nonlinear optical effect is not utilized, it is not necessary to make laser light having sufficiently high intensity of the degree in which the nonlinear optical effect is generated be incident on the optical diode 21 as incident light. <P>COPYRIGHT: (C)2006,JPO&NCIPI |
