On the measurement of the electro-optic properties of poled side-chain copolymer films with a modified Teng-Man technique

We report on the measurement of the electro-optic properties of poled side-chain copolymer films by means of a time-resolved ellipsometric version of the Teng and Man experiment. The polymer is a side-chain Disperse Red 1 substituted poly(methyl methacrylate). The technique makes use of polymer layers sandwiched between indium tin oxide and metal electrodes. We show that the technique can give a good evaluation of the real electro-optic properties if operated in a wavelength range outside the absorption bands of the indium tin oxide layers. In this case we evaluated the temperature dependence of the relaxation time constant and found that it is described by an Arrhenius like dependence as a function of temperature. The activation energies and the time constants are in agreement with data reported in literature. (C) 1999 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.