Long-pitch cholesteric liquid crystals for display applications

Cholesteric liquid crystals (CLCs) have been used for a reflective display because of their reflective nature in the planar state. In a reflective display, the planar and the focal-conic states are used for the bright state and the dark state, respectively. In this paper we introduce a long-pitch CLC device, in which a selective wavelength of the reflected light is shifted to infrared (IR) wavelengths by controlling the pitch. The planar state of a long-pitch CLC device is transparent over the entire visible wavelengths in the field-off state. Omni-directional achromatic reflection through light scattering in the focal-conic state can be achieved without a polarizer. Compared to conventional CLC cells that reflect the visible light in the planar state, a long-pitch CLC device has a longer pitch, of which the operating voltage for switching between the two state is much lower so that achromatic reflective displays and light shutters with low power consumption can be realized using long-pitch CLC devices. By coupling with a reflector, the light efficiency of a long-pitch CLC cell in the focal-conic state can be enhanced, by which higher brightness can be obtained for application to reflective displays. A dye-doped long-pitch CLC device can be placed behind a transparent organic light-emitting diode display for use as a light shutter to block the ambient light.