Visible light full Stokes polarization imaging based on twisted liquid crystal micro-polarizer arrays

The micro-polarizer array is the key component of the division of focal-plane (DoFP) polarization imaging method. Currently, it is possible to achieve full Stokes information detection at a single wavelength using a designed array with the highest signal-to-noise ratio. To broaden the working wavelength to the visible range and achieve high-accuracy full Stokes polarization information, this paper proposes a micro-polarizer array structure based on twisted liquid crystal. The particle swarm optimization algorithm is utilized to optimize the device parameters, with the condition number as the evaluation function. A series of elliptically polarized lights are under measurement using the designed device. The results show that the errors of the degree of linear polarization (DoLP), degree of circular polarization (DoCP), and angle of polarization, are less than 2.00%, 1.50%, and 1.45%, respectively. All the results indicate that the twisted liquid crystal micro-polarizer array enables the high-accuracy measurement of full Stokes information within the visible range. (c) 2024 Optica Publishing Group under the terms of the Optica Open Access Publishing Agreement